


The Thin Orange Line

by GreenasCole



Series: Mandarin [4]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV), The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Alpha Derek, Alpha Scott, Alpha Stiles, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fusion, BAMF Sheriff Stilinski, BAMF Stiles, Character Death, Fae & Fairies, Hunters, Intrigue, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Minor Character Death, The Alpha Pack, Wizards
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-02
Updated: 2013-12-02
Packaged: 2017-12-31 05:26:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 10
Words: 50,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1027747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenasCole/pseuds/GreenasCole
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two weeks after the events of "Once in an Orange Moon" Stiles and the pack perform a powerful ritual to locate their missing members, but what they find is not what they were expecting.  What does the shadowy Deucalion expect to gain from the "gift" he gives Derek?  As bodies begin to pile up bearing the hallmarks of Druidic sacrifice can Stiles and his fellow Alphas unravel the identities and motivations of their attackers in time?  Or will their enemies band together to take down the pack and claim the trio's power for themselves?</p><p>And will Stiles ever manage to get his boyfriend into bed again?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cherry Bomb

**Author's Note:**

> Turns out fan fiction is A-Okay for NaNoWriMo, so here we go. But since I kind of feel like it's a bit of cop-out I've decided to ease my mind by writing three 50,000 word fics concurrently this month. I'm clearly insane. Don't judge me all my classes are T/R, including back to back biochemistry and bionanoengineering (I sleep through those and get A's but barely pulled a B- in Intro Statistics doing fives times as much work and flat-out failed PoliSci 101. My brain is a weird place). Fortunately, all that matters for this is being able to write fast. Strangely this will be the hardest fic to crank out on schedule because the potential focus is so broad. Should be fun, though.
> 
> On a more relevant note, the series is now taking on a more Dresden-y feel as the events in Beacon Hills become tangled up in the greater world of the Dresdenverse. Faeries! Fomor! War! Prophecy! Enthusiastically gratuitous epicness!
> 
> Also, more will be explained about the mechanics of this fusion-verse. If something in particular doesn't make sense let me know, I may have lost part of my outline in a stack of hand-drawn 3-D pictures of adenosine triphosphate transmembrane proton pumps or something. Maybe I should change my major to something with vocabulary words this interface doesn't universally underline as spelling errors.

As it turned out, getting one’s consciousness forcibly ejected from the spirit world and into the Astral Plane had some lingering consequences.  Shocker.  For the first few days after his disastrous attempt to hook up with Derek in the Nevernever, it took _both_ of his fellow Alphas placing their hands on his head simultaneously to pull out the searing agony when a migraine hit.  His ring system had a healing function built in but there were limits when it came to injuries that were more spiritual than physical, especially when the pain was too bad to see much less perform delicate magic.

In the two weeks since the Night of Bad Dreams his condition had improved significantly but he was still having headaches.  The throbbing was not helped one bit by the wooden practice sword that struck the side of his head for the fourth time in an hour.

“No, no, NO!” his instructor yelled, “for the last time: visualize your high guard wrapping around or else side-stepping blows will still strike you.  It only takes a tiny fraction of the original force to sever the arteries of the head and neck!  For someone who thinks in such twisty curves your technique is mundanely angular.”

Stiles was going to _kill_ Jackson.  The next time the SOB made a joke about his “ass whipping” (Deaton had referred to his condition as “Astral Whiplash”, if only there was someone to sue) he was gonna full on Vader choke him.  Sadly that would in no way nullify the deal that kept him getting his skull tenderized by a demented unicorn on a daily basis.  He had assumed when he agreed to let “Zea” (uni-CORN, ba dun ching) train him it would be in _magic_ , not _fencing_.

Stupid Stiles.  Bad.

“Come on, my head is killing me!” he whined futilely.

“How ironically apropos.  Spare me your childish complaints; you’ve already repaired the damage,” Zea replied with a wicked grin.

Crap, the elder faerie was right.  Instead of a rapidly swelling goose egg there was just a small patch of slightly tender skin behind his temple.  A sneaking suspicion rose in him “ _That’s_ why we’ve been playing three musketeers for over a week!?  For _healing_ practice!?”

The glamoured face glowed with smugness under the sunglasses and slicked hair (the unicorn had inexplicably modeled his appearance on a 50’s greaser punk).  “In part.  The important thing is that you can now do it during combat.  Rogue werewolves rarely pause for timeouts to let their opponents recover.”  The smug look turned thoughtful.  “Of course, competence with a blade also reduces the difficulty of healing, in a sense, assuming one’s opponent is not similarly gifted”

Stiles grimaced at that.  “I don’t really like the idea of using a blade.  Swords have no other purpose than killing.”

“Ah yes, _The Wheel of Time”_ , (damn it it’s like the [man] snuck in and read his whole bookshelf!), “continue paraphrasing my favorite works and I might find myself forgetting you gave your virginity to Viscount Hale.”

“While I love watching _Derek_ turn red when call him that please stop talking about my sex life when I’m trying to not to get my head bashed in.”

Zea laughed and re-engaged him.  “You’re just bitter you don’t currently _have_ one,” he said in a series of serpentine slashes, punctuating his gibe with a lightning-fast thrust that Stile barely managed to turn aside.

“Just so.”  Damn he was spending so much time with the fae and starting to pick up ye olde phrases.  Just what he needed to really blend in a California high school.

“Ridiculous human customs,” the unicorn said with a snort.  Stiles felt no particular desire to contest the point.

A howl from the edge of the preserve sounded out the end of the afternoon’s practice.  Like most ageless creatures Zea had a poor understanding of mortal time and would otherwise continue the lesson until Stiles literally collapsed.

Stiles raised his sword in a mocking salute “I guess we’re done for the day.  Gotta go, lot’s to do before moonrise.”

Zea sighed in resignation “Ah the impatience of youth.  I must advise against this plan.”

“Yeah, you mentioned that before.”  Always with the nay sayers.  Or in this case neigh sayers.  Ha.  Maybe he should have let Melissa give him that MRI to check for brain damage; his funny bone seemed to be broken.  “It’s the only way to save Erica and Boyd.”

“Perhaps.  I would suggest simply making some new pets.  You have two prime sires in your kennel and a whole school building full of impressionable youths to choose from.”

Sometimes Stiles came close to forgetting that the creature in front of him, however friendly and human seeming, was also one of the oldest of the wicked fae and had a _very_ different set values.  Fortunately Zea would then say things like _that_.  “Gah!  That’s my best friend and my boyfriend you’re talking about,” he said indignantly, though suppressing his laughter robbed the protest of any real heat.  He’d always had a vicious sense of humor but he was starting to wonder if there were…consequences to prolonged contact with the power of Winter.  Beacause duh.

“As you wish little wolf.  Run along, I will see you at the next waning of the moon.”

They put their wooden swords in imaginary sheaths at their sides and bowed respectfully before he took off through the trees with a wave.  After only a few steps the circle of rowans that formed the practice clearing vanished from sight (he was pretty sure it spent most its time existing elsewhere, which was scary).

 

When he reached the road Derek was there leaning against the Camaro like always.  Stiles dropped length of rowan wood and threw himself into his arms.  Also like always, Stiles attempts at a passionate hello kiss were derailed by an uncooperative Derek who was too busy trying to literally rub himself all over him.

“Urgh, you smell like faerie and Mountain Ash.  I don’t like it,” he groused.

Stiles sighed “Next time you say that I’m going to record it and make it your personalized ringtone for the entire packs’ cell phones.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me.”  He resumed kissing Derek, making sure to grope, pinch, and tease every place he knew would help heat things up in his ongoing assault on the bastion of the werewolf’s self-control.

They’d been playing this game for a while now and Stiles had yet to score.  “Stop that,” Derek growled, “we’re not doing this.”  Stiles opened his mouth but before he could say anything he was interrupted by an angry “Call me Edward Cullen one more time and you’ll take over the _entire_ pack’s spots in Lydia’s potion testing rotation for the next _month_.”

He shuddered at the thought.  Much like Stiles’s ill-fated college tour the Night of Bad Dreams had been a motivating experience for the strawberry blond Banshee.  She was a natural with potion making and was making up new concoctions for testing on a daily basis.  Unfortunately she was also a big believer in the saying “you learn twice as much from failure as from success” and the pack had begun to suspect she would sometimes deliberately screw up just to observe the results.  All the hair on Jackson’s body was still a shocking shade of yellow, but Stiles thought that might have less to do with advancing her skills and more with how her ex-boyfriend had run off without having the guts to say goodbye properly.

Either way it was _hilarious_.

“Fine,” Stiles breathed out, defeated.  “But when I spontaneously combust one of these days you’ll only have yourself to blame.”

Derek’s lips twitched but he managed not to show any significant reaction despite being baited with more Bella Swanisms.  Stiles had been merciless since his muscley, tough, Alpha boyfriend accidentally chuckled at an obscure _Twilight_ reference.  “Come on, we’re having pack dinner with your dad before your big night.”  He opened Stiles’s door for him, probably still trying to regain some man points after the fallout from Meyer-gate.

Stiles scooped up his sword and got in without taking any more cheap shots.  See: he wasn’t cold and heartless.  He managed to leave off the “yet” in his own mind.  Which was quite a feat considering how he immediately went back to mentally going over the plan for tonight’s assault on the Alpha Pack.  He’d need to be cold for this if he wanted to ready to do whatever it took to protect his pack.  He may not have been an Alpha long but that was one lesson he didn’t need to be taught.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“I don’t like this, Stiles.  You’re seventeen and I won’t stay behind while run off to possibly commit multiple homicide.”

Stiles groaned around a mouthful of curly fries.  His dad had been giving him versions of this speech ever since he’d told him about the plan.  This was the first time in front of the whole pack though, and the Alpha in him bristled at being so openly challenged.  Scott and Derek looked like they wanted jump to his defense but the same instincts compelled them to let him handle this himself.  “We’ve heard your objections and taken them into consideration, dad.”  He was never going to get used to addressing his Father the Sheriff with steel in his voice and Alpha authority shining crimson in his eyes.  “We’re not looking for a fight if we don’t have to.  If they hand over Erica and Boyd we’ll leave without incident.  If they don’t we’ll leave with as little bloodshed as possible, in as few pieces as possible”

He could see his dad struggling to find a reasonable argument, struggling to ignore the Alpha power, just struggling in general lately.  Stiles knew he was the cause and it made his stomach feel full of live snakes.  In the end the Sheriff just deflated and stared down at his hands.  “I understand.  It’s _pack_.”  Stiles thought wistfully of the days when everyone he knew couldn’t read the world of meaning in those two words.

“Besides,” Scott interjected, “having you at the station means that if things get out of control we’ll have backup if we need it, and less chance of innocent people getting caught in the crossfire.”  Stiles sent gratitude at him through the ‘net, to which he responded with solidarity.  It was still bizarre that such complex emotions had become like words in their silent communications.

“But what about Danny?” the Sheriff asked changing tactics.  “All of this hinges on him surviving the Bite, which you’ve all told me repeatedly is not a sure thing.”

It was Lydia that fielded that one “My test solution indicated a high index of compatibility.  Plus with a surplus of Alphas, Danny already being pack, the use of mortal magic, and his willful participation in the ritual the conditions are ideal.  I estimate he has the same chance of dying from the Bite during the spell as he has of dying in a car crash on the way there, slightly less if Scott is driving.”

“Hey!” Scott yelled offended while Stiles briefly entertained the idea of asking Derek how he felt about open relationships, evil genius being particularly hot on Lydia.  The thought fizzled out at a quizzical eyebrow from Derek as he felt the blip of heat.  Stupid Packnet.  His boyfriend smiled victorious at the chagrin washing over him.  Possessive thy name is werewolf.

“If anyone’s interested in my opinion?” Danny asked drily, “I want the bite either way.  This gives me my best chance.  Don’t think of it as maybe risking lives but as definitely saving two, and possibly three.”

God bless Danny Mahealani.  The Sheriff looked like he swallowed a lemon but couldn’t find an objection to that so he merely nodded.  He then shifted his gaze to Stiles and took an enormous bite of his triple bacon cheeseburger with exaggerated slowness, complete with yummy sounds.  Stiles scowled but kept his mouth shut.  His dad did _not_ play fair.

Derek stood and swept the remains of the pack’s Burger King feast into a trash can (the kid in the drive-through window had almost cried when Stiles dictated their massive order to him).  He retrieved the schematics he’d drawn while Stiles and Lydia laid out the specifics of the ritual (because _of course_ he was a secret artist).  “I want to go over this one more time just make sure nobody forgets something and screws this up.”  He looked each pack member in the eyes one at a time, some for longer than others.  Peter actually placed a hand over his heart like he was horribly wounded at his nephew’s narrow-eyed scrutiny.  Necrowolf ass.   “This is how we’ll do it.”

 

Two hours later they were gathered at the precise heart of their territory: the site of the new manor house.  Despite the seemingly endless funds in the Hale family accounts there was only so fast a house could be built, but enough of the foundation had been poured to give them something to stand on.  Lydia remained outside the largest of the three circles drawn on the barren floor in chalk.  She wasn’t a werewolf but she was supernatural by blood and they were unsure if her immunity would contaminate the spell.  She hadn’t been thrilled by this decision, already feeling a little more outside than the rest of the pack, but agreed to watch out for interruptions.  On the inside of the first circle stood Isaac Jackson, and Peter at the equilateral points.  Within the second stood Scott and Derek on two of the spirals of a huge Triskele, the center of which was not a point but the third circle where Danny stood.

Stiles waited by Lydia on the periphery.  While she put all her focus into the supersensory charm, guarding them, he waited on the moon.  He felt it when it turned new, the faintest sliver of light peeking past the Earth’s shadow, too faint for even his enhanced vision but screaming through his arcane senses like an air raid siren.

It was time.

He stepped into the first circle and closed it with a touch, beginning the chant as he walked desoil.  This was by far the most complex and difficult thing he’d ever done and quite possibly ever would do.  Even if he’d had a hair or blood sample (the former extra unlikely in Boyd’s case) he didn’t have the juice to make the spell cover the sprawling expanse of Beacon County.  Instead he was going to try and track the Bite _itself_. 

As he passed the shifted Beta werewolves in the outer circle, the recitation included a verse personalized to each.  Peter, the born wolf who had become Alpha and turned Scott; Jackson, Derek’s first bitten wolf who had been Kanima; and Isaac, the first true Beta of the new pack.  When he returned to his starting point he crossed into the second circle and closed it behind him.  It snapped shut with a ringing tone that he couldn’t hear so much as _feel_. 

He took up his place at the third spiral on the Triskele, his voice vibrating through the ground as he spoke.  The harsh music of the Gaelic rhyme thrummed in the air as he motioned for is fellow Alphas to join him in approaching the final circle and the nervous young man inside it.  The three of them took up position around Danny.  Derek was once again in beast form while Scott was in full wolf; together with Stiles they were man, animal, and both.  Three forms for three Alphas for three turns of the Triskele.

As they’d rehearsed Danny knelt and tilted his head to one side, allowing wolf!Scott to momentarily place his jaws at the trembling human’s neck before stepping back onto his spiral.  The prospective Beta tilted his head the other way for Derek who repeated the process.  This time, however, Danny raised his forearm in offering (he’d decided against the torso bite the others had gotten).  Quickly but not violently, the Alpha clamped down.  He released the limb as gently as possible before returning to his position.

Now it was Stiles’s turn.  He joined Danny kneeling, holding the translucent tablet of raw corundum before him.  The piece of crystal came from the same block of ore that have given them the rubies for the Packnets’ earrings.  It was a literal piece of the territory, carved to show the natural features of the land, the land that the Hale pack had held, lived, and bled for for over two centuries.  He let several drops of the blood mixed with Alpha saliva seeping from the Bite drip onto the mapstone which began to glow from within in a shifting shimmer of scarlet.

Danny placed his hands on the tablet and they both stood, Stiles closing the circle and taking the final place on the Triskele.  One final recitation and the earth began to tremble.  Crap!  Oh, well, good thing his father was at the station to field calls about the freaking _tremor_.  It was way too late to stop now.  He reached down with his mind to the spot deep below where the three leylines met and poured out the radiant aura of power that gave Beacon Hills its name.  All lines carried a particular character, a specific frequency that defined them.  Here flowed three massive pipelines of energy.  Stiles saw them as different colors in his mind’s eye.  Under Derek’s feet ran a chaotic river of destructive red power.  Scott stood atop a leaping current of golden yellow that carried the promise of healing and renewal.  Beneath Stiles flowed a calm beam of serene cerulean offering the strength to simply endure and protect instead of change and alter.  As he connected them to the spell everything, the air, the ground, _them_ , became suffused with a pure white light that was slowly overtaken by red as the glow from the tablet brightened. 

When the blaze of scarlet had expanded to consume the entirety of the clearing around the construction site, the eyes of all the wolves, and Stiles and Danny, glowed Alpha red as well.

It was working.  Seeing the predicted signal the pack spoke in unison (although Scott’s wolfy vocalizations weren’t speech per se) and split the air like a clap of silent thunder as they quietly intoned “One Land.  One Spirit.  One Pack.”

The pressure of the spell surged, doubling and redoubling in a sweeping avalanche of magical energy.  With a pained shout Stiles reached through his rings and broke the circles telekinetically, inner to outer, smearing the lines in a single swift motion.

The trembling ground gave one last great shake like a sub-vocal ring from a titanic gong as the spell raced out along the leylines, linking the land, _their territory_ , to the map.  Stiles swayed on his feet but was quickly steadied by a snuffling and concerned Derek.

“I’m good,” he said, rubbing Derek’s muzzle consolingly.  He raised his voice “Danny, you doing okay over there?”

“Yeah…wow.”  He looked _poleaxed_.  “That was…wow.  And hey, my arm is totally healed already.”

“Huzzah!” Stiles cried weakly.

Lydia sashayed up to him and rubbed his forearm soothingly.  Two months ago he would have practically passed out from the thrill of that contact, exhaustion notwithstanding.  Now he just smiled at her.  He guessed he really had moved on, which meant Derek wouldn’t be eating any Banshee tartare.  Yay.  “Let me take it from here honey.”

Isaac and Peter retrieved the giant piece of white canvas they’d drawn a map of the man made features of the county on and hung it up on the wooden skeleton of the house.  Jackson brought over a small table and set it in a precise spot under Lydia’s direction.  Apparently she had done the trigonometry in her head to get the angles just perfect, having more or less done away with not terrifying the pack with her mental powers.  She placed and lit a candle on the table and motioned Danny over to hold the tablet in front of the flame.

“Stars wars knockoff,” quipped Jackson.

That got some fire going in Stiles again as he hung off beast!Derek’s massive shoulders.  “Shut it, Jar-Jar, or I’ll re-snakify you and find you a nice swamp to live in.”

Jackson snorted but couldn’t quite hide the flicker of unease, and more surprisingly respect, he felt at the empty threat.  Mostly empty.  Stiles was pretty sure he couldn’t actually do that.  Best not to look into it in any case.

“Quiet please children,” murmured Lydia as she activated the mapstone.  The light from the candle seemed to get sucked into the translucent substance, which projected it onto the canvas map like a single frame from a movie reel.  The canvas took on a ruddy hue, brighter where the carvings of streams and valleys made the crystal thinner.  There were also two clusters of bright crimson lights.  One of them was dead center, showing exactly where they all stood at that very moment.  They were also a pair of tiny lights further away, but nowhere near as far as they had expected.  They were in the town itself, just blocks from Main Street!

Stiles would have whooped and jumped for joy if he’d thought he could manage without falling flat on his face.  “Quick!  Where is that!?”

Isaac pulled out a more traditional paper map.  Fortunately Lydia had remembered that no cell phone would ever survive being close to a spell like that and made sure they packed an alternative.  “Weird, it’s a bank.”

“Which-“ Stiles started, but before he could even finish his question the pack’s heads all snapped up to face the direction of the Sheriff’s station as alarm and apprehension roared down the Packnet from his father.  “Dad…”

The sense of the Sheriff was already moving in their direction, fast.  “Come on,” Derek growled in the gravelly basso of his distorted vocal chords, “we’ll meet him at the emergency rendezvous point.”  He turned to face their newest Beta “Can you run?”

“Sure.  I feel kind of pumped to be honest.  I can see why you wanted this so bad, Jax”

“Awesome isn’t it, aside from having to be in a pack with McCall,” he replied teasingly.  The two of them were in the incessant but mostly good-natured ribbing phase of burying the hatchet.

“Rowf!” wolf!Scott yelped in offense.

“Enough!”  Derek’s monster voice would cow anyone, werewolf or not, but it made the Betas flinch like they’d been slapped.  “Scott, shift into Alpha form and carry Lydia, I have Stiles.”

“This is _so_ humiliating.”  Stiles moaned.  Derek just gave him a look that said “deal with it” and slung him around his shoulders, holding his arms like the straps of a backpack.  “Well then, high  ho Silver away!”  He leaned in close to one of Derek’s ears.  “Knew you couldn’t wait for me to mount you again.”

He whispered it but it didn’t matter to werewolf ears and the pack erupted in strangled tittering.  Derek snapped his head back into Stiles’s nose getting a squawk of surprise and another, louder round of chuckles.

“Okay I deserved that,” he said, smoothing away the injury without having to think about it.  “Let’s go see what went horribly, horribly wrong.”

The laughter died in an instant as the pack focused on what was next.  They had a location, three incensed Alphas, a pack of Betas, an enchanter, a budding witch and killer potioneer, and a great honking pile of wolfsbane-laced weapons.  Tonight they were taking back what was theirs.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Perhaps if Stiles hadn’t had magically enhanced senses the sight of the darkened bank would have been grimly foreboding and sinister.  Instead it just looked dusty and slightly hangdog.  For the first actual supervillain lair he’d ever gotten to see it was kind of a letdown.  Lydia had hung back with the Sheriff while Stiles took up a watch on the front and the others circled the building in silence.

Dead Silence.  He refused to let the words “too easy” so much as flit across his mind.  But there was nothing else for it: there was nobody here.  They’d found a collection of fresh trails leaving the building out a side door that were only a few minutes old, but all it led to was a lingering scent of exhaust a block over where several vehicles had recently been parked.

“I don’t like this,” Derek whispered beside him in Beta shape, lisping around his fangs.

Any other time Stiles would have commented on the cuteness, but now was not the time for relationship adorableness.  “Me neither, but probably not for the same reasons.”

“What do you mean?”  His inquisitive face looked weird without eyebrows.

“They _just_ cleared out.  If this is a trap then they…did it _wrong_.  If it’s not then they were tipped off.  The tremor from the spell might have reached all the way here but that hardly screams “werewolves inbound!””

Derek snorted at that, although in this form it sounded like a doggy sneeze.  So _not_ cute.  _Nope_.

“Dad said the call came in just seconds later, and they asked for _him_ personally.”

“What did he say exactly?”

“It was a man, British-y accent, the guy asked for him and said “Please convey my respects to your son and tell Derek I’m pleased to be making his re-acquaintance soon.  Until then I’ve left some gifts: one for him, and one for us.”  Stiles put as much scorn and mockery as he could into the quote, in the same voice he used for his Madonna impression.

“Damn it.  His name’s Deucalion.  He’s…intense, even my mother respected him.”  It was probably the first time Stiles had heard him mention his family without an accompanying spike of anger and grief.  Of course it was hard to tell since his emotions were currently drawn tighter than piano wire.

“Well he’s not here now.  If there’s anyone left they’re in the vault or I’d be able to hear their heartbeat or see their heat signatures.”

“Then we go in.  Carefully.”

“Agreed.”  Stiles sent three rapid “pulses” into the Packnet.  Eventually the bonds would be strong enough to convey coherent thoughts (Derek had managed a sending when he was Wolfzilla because he was holding most of Stiles’s magic at the time) but for now it could only convey…focus.  Three blips was the signal for “reform on me”.  He left his hiding place on the roof of the building opposite the bank and leapt down, cushioning his landing with a downthrust of pure force, dropping into a roll and popping up to his feet.

Derek dropped down into a crouch a beat later.  “Showoff,” he said smiling fondly.

“Werewolf,” Stiles countered.

Together they crept forward keeping to the shadows as much as possible, the pack melting out of the night to join them one by one.  The inside the bank was much more aesthetically pleasing, in a creepy horror movie setting kind of way.  Even their carefully honed abilities at stealth couldn’t hide the signs of their presence in echoing expanse of cold marble, and practicing against werewolves raised your skill level pretty quick.  He was glad they weren’t really trying an ambush.  It would have been suicide.  Why the hell had they abandoned the perfect deathtrap?

As they moved further in he could smell unwashed bodies and old blood, but nothing that would suggest someone had died here.  The smells intensified until they got to the vault, which was closed.  However, someone had thoughtfully left a sticky note with the combination for the huge lock stuck to it.  It was pink and sat in a smiley face gouged into the metal, right where the tongue would be it was sticking out at them.

“Points for presentation, I guess,” Stiles said.  More and more he was feeling uneasy.  Not because he thought this was a trap, but because he didn’t.  Nothing here gave them any clues about why the Alpha pack was here or what Deucalion’s end game might be.  “Let’s open it and collect our “gifts”.

Derek slapped his hands away when he reached for the wheel.  He rolled his eyes but stepped aside and let the Big Bad Wolf open the door.  While Derek turned the wheel Stiles hummed “Pop Goes the Weasel”, finishing the last bar of the song just after the click of the lock sliding back.  It took both of them to pull open the door (it looked like it had been unsettled in its frame from repeated blows with werewolf strength) as Scott waited poised and ready to intercept any shrieking tentacled horrors that may slither forth to do battle.  Stiles decided he needed to watch some rom-coms with Derek to dilute the concentration of genre and fantasy films in his Netflix queue.  Clearly they were starting to get to him and he had a superfluity of that kind of imagery in his daily life as it was.

Scott sucked in a shocked breath as the vault door screeched open “It’s them!”  His shocked look grew confused.  “And…someone else?”

Stiles didn’t really need Scott to tell him; he could smell them, and the stranger who didn’t smell as strange as (she?) should.  He also smelled blood, a lot of it.  _Erica’s blood_.

Somehow he beat out Derek to rush past Scott into the vault, skidding down next to her and kneeling despite the creeping puddle of blood.  “Erica!  Come on Catwoman.”  He gave her shoulders a gentle shake.

“Boyd’s okay,” Derek said, “he’s just unconscious. 

“This one’s fine too, except for the marks on the back of her neck.” 

Stiles looked over at the second girl laying face down and away from them.  He felt the back of Erica’s neck and found the same precise claw marks directly over her spine.  “What have they done to them?” he asked no one in particular.

“Hmmm, I’ll explain later,” Peter mused from the doorway.

“B-Batman?” Erica said, stirring weakly.  She tried to open her eyes but barely managed a flutter.  The blood seeping from her wounds was beginning to run black.

“I’ve got you.  I can fix this.”

“Stiles!” Derek warned, but it was too late.

Repairing wounds was about the hardest thing a person could do, magically speaking.  Since Stiles didn’t have the strength to force it through he’d compensated by formulating the enchantment to deliver specific manipulations to the damaged tissues instead of a general command of “Heal!”.  It let him get a lot more bang for his buck energetically, but required him to learn how to treat every conceivable injury separately, in detail, from the _molecular_ _level up_.  Hooray for Adderall and his hacked subscription to the online library at Harvard Med.

The great gaping slashes across Erica’s face and torso weren’t horribly complicated, but the sheer volume of injuries would make trying to repair them borderline insane even when he wasn’t running on fumes.  Fortunately, nobody had ever accused Stiles of having much in the way of common sense.

Tendon.  Ligament.  Muscle.  Dermis.  Epidermis.  He realized he was muttering out loud as he performed the dozen tiny adjustments needed to jumpstart healing at each level, over and over, wound after wound.  While he did that he pulled on his pack bonds, drawing in as much juice as he could to keep himself going while his vision tunneled and his head spun.  He didn’t stop until saw the healing had begun to continue on its own, his ministrations as an Alpha neutralizing the pernicious influence of her Alpha attacker.

Her eyes snapped open and she sucked in a huge ragged breath.  “H-H-Holy fucking healing powers, Batman,” she yelled coughing spastically.

“Stiles,” Derek said in a broken voice.  Stiles was losing coherence but the fractured clash of emotions coming from his boyfriend wouldn’t have been comprehendible on his best day.

“Sup?” he slurred drunkenly, grinning at him crookedly.

“This is my younger sister, Cora.”  He was holding the unconscious girl in his arms like she was made of spun glass and looking at her with a kind of awe and reverence reserved for people coming face to face with their gods.

“Well, fuck.” Stiles wheezed out around his overwhelmed laughter.  The effort was the last straw for his depleted body and he slid down onto the floor bonelessly, heedless of blood.  “Ahm thinka nap now.”  He passed out under the exasperated glares of his pack, reunited at last.


	2. Lady in Red

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek and Cora have it out.
> 
> The pack has its first dinner in the new house and the Sheriff has a surprise.
> 
> Stiles forgets himself in front of the wrong person during a crisis.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, this chapter isn't quite edited properly. Maintaining 5,000 words a day between all my various projects is rough.
> 
> Also, chopping off chapters at a word count leads to some odd breaks in POV's.
> 
> There is some minor use of alcohol.
> 
> Oh, and some sexytimez that doesn't technically break any rules. Technically.

Derek was willing to admit he’d gone a little bit overboard with the new Hale Manor.  The shock of finding Cora alive after all these years had only made things worse.  A few weeks earlier Stiles had proclaimed that they had successfully exorcised him of the demon Broody McSourwolf.  Derek suspected it had taken up residence in his younger sister.  After two weeks he still couldn’t get her to open up, not even enough to tell him where she’d been the last seven years. 

It was remotely possible he’d overcompensated.

The new house was always going to be huge, three stories with both a basement and attic, but then he’d gone and splurged extravagantly on the details.  With fireproofing, steel reinforcements, bulletproof glass, earthquake proofing, state of the art security, and every magical countermeasure available, no one in his family would ever be taken from him again while under this roof. 

If only she actually seemed to _want_ to be there.

Tomorrow was first day of school and tonight’s pack dinner/sleepover was as much to celebrate the fact that all the teenage pack members (Cora included!) were actually going to _go_ as it was to commemorate the move-in.

 

“Derek, honey, if you keep staring at that pot it’s not going to boil any faster.  It might explode, though.”  It never ceased to amaze him how quickly Melissa had adopted him as a third son.

“Sorry I’m just…”

“Worried, I know.”  She gripped his shoulder and gave him a small encouraging smile.  “I’m a mother of one and sometimes I feel like I’m running around with my hair on fire.  You have to be father, brother, and son for entire _pack_.  Every day you don’t flee screaming is something to be proud of.”

They all spent so much time orbiting the outer limits of weird it was nice to have someone in the pack so down to earth.

“Who let you in kitchen anyway?  I thought Stiles had a guard posted?”

“It was _one time_ and I still maintain someone replaced the olive oil with napalm.”

“How about you go get me some fresh cilantro from the greenhouse.  Take your time.  If anyone asks I’ll tell them you went to find something heavy to lift,” she said eyeing his muscles in mock appreciation.

“Thanks.”

“De nada.”

The greenhouse (conservatory if Lydia was in earshot) was larger than most houses, and bursting with plants, most of which he couldn’t identify.  The growth rate was more than a little suspicious given that that half of them had been seedling a mere week before.  Stiles and Lydia had assured him that they weren’t up to anything sinister but Derek was keeping an eye out for reports of missing dentists.  He thought wistfully of the days when attack by man eating plants would have surprised him.

Instead he found Cora staring at a pot of black peonies with her usual expression of quiet devastation.

“Hey,” he said.  Master of Conversation, that was him.  “How are you…settling in.”

She made a non-committal grunt and kept brooding over the ruffled blooms like they held the answer to some deep mystery.  She had flatly refused to accept a Packnet talisman, leaving him with option but to drag her feelings out into the open the old fashioned way.

“Cora, talk to me.”

She sighed beleaguered “Fine, let’s do this.  After Uncle Peter got me out of the fire I was alone, burned, and terrified out of my mind.  I ran for months but _no one_ ever came after me.  I was only ten years old.” 

The pangs of guilt felt like swords running him through.  He could only imagine the kind of things she might have had to do to survive and he doubted he’d ever have the strength to ask.

“Then after seven years, out of the blue, I hear that werewolves had returned to Beacon Hills, led by a powerful new Alpha, a Hale.  When I finally get up the nerve to come back here I get kidnapped by the fucking Alpha Pack and thrown in a bank vault for three months.”

He winced at that.  His own sister had been right under his nose all that time and he didn’t find her.  She had the right to be angry.

“Now suddenly I have a pack again, but it’s like I’ve fallen into the twilight zone.  My favorite Uncle who sacrificed himself to save me has been replaced by a monster with the eyes of a killer.”  She turned to face him when she said that, accusation in her expression.  He hadn’t thought she knew how his own eyes had turned blue.  “And then there’s you.  My sweet, devastated older brother has been replaced with a bipolar Alpha that flip-flops between trying to set things on fire with an angry glare and making goo-goo eyes at the underage _boy_ he’s banging here at the Hale Home for Trouble Teen Wolves.  Forgive me if I need time to adjust.”

Derek couldn’t help it.  For a few moments the years of hurt, loneliness, and confusion hung in the air between them before something slipped in inside him.  He laughed, long and hard and loud.  For a moment Cora looked at him like he’d lost his mind while a grin tried to force its way onto her face.

“Derek stop it.”  He laughed harder.  “ _Stop_ , it’s not funny!”  Tears were running down his face and it was getting hard to breathe.  “Fine you big freak; I give up!” she yelled, joining him in hysterical laughter.

When Melissa came in ten minutes later they were still going, clutching each other desperately to stop from keeling over.  They trailed off under her gaze while she tried to keep a neutral smile on her face.  “So…cilantro?”

This time she joined them in cracking up.  If his and Cora’s laughter was still a bit strained it was simple and honest.  Their lives were beyond absurd, but then, they were pack.  Sometimes it came with the territory.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

He should have known that the drama had only been beaten back, not defeated.  When they finally pulled themselves together there was a surprise waiting for them in the form of an unexpected guest.

Sheriff Stilinski had brought his girlfriend.

Using that word felt a little weird given their ages but calling her “the woman the Sheriff was seeing” sounded too much like a quote from a political exposé.  The pack had been _merciless_ when they’d found out Stilinksi had been secretly seeing her since _April_.  Stiles had eventually lost his temper and imposed a moratorium on all discussion pertaining to his Father’s relationship.  One he enforced by magically sealing the jaws shut of anyone who broke it within range of his hearing.

Tonight was her first night meeting the pack as a whole and Stiles was a wreck.  He had been borderline frosty towards her during the handful of crushingly awkward “get to know Stiles and his boyfriend” outings.  The night the four of them had gone out to dinner a waiter had “tripped”, spilling a pitcher of ice water directly down the poor woman’s top.  The Sheriff had been beyond livid.

Bafflingly it was Stiles who kept encouraging his Father see her in the first place and woe to any in the pack who so much as snickered at seeing the Sheriff with hearts floating around his head.  Jackson had made the mistake of calling her a “badge bunny” one time when he and Stiles saw the couple in Starbucks during a pack coffee run.  The ensuing “incident” was straight out of _Carrie_ and had kept the shop closed for repairs for over a week.

Tonight the she and the Sheriff were announcing a “surprise” and Derek wasn’t sure the house was going to hold up despite the fortifications.  The manor was infused with Stiles’s magic and had begun to manifest his internal conflict in an increasingly startling series of disturbances.  If they made it through dinner without it devolving into a scene from _Poltergeist_ it would be a miracle. 

Derek knew the instant they arrived when the candles on the dining room table suddenly sent up two foot jets of crimson flame.  He moved to stand behind the sweating, twitching Stiles and massaged his rigid shoulders.  “Shhh, it’s okay.  Breathe.  Everything’s going to go fine.  The pack’s been practicing their stories all afternoon.  We’ll have a nice meal, some light conversation, and then a good night’s sleep.”

“I’m sorry for being such a weirdo.  I want my dad to happy, and I really like her but I just… _hate_ her, you know?”

Derek had no frickin’ clue but he at least he could be supportive.  “I think that’s normal.”

“Maybe.”  He looked massively unconvinced.

“Come on, I have to play gracious host.  Do you want to stay here and set the table instead?”

“Yes thank you,” he gushed, “go, greet, distract.”  He scampered off into the kitchen to start pulling out the plates and silverware, leaving Derek standing there shaking his head fondly.

He walked out of the dining room and through the arms of the grand staircase into the foyer to greet the happy couple.  Stiles wasn’t saying anything but Derek suspected he had done the math: older couple + five months of dating + meeting the extended family (pack) = engaged.  Derek wanted to reassure him but they could both smell the love, and simply speaking the word fiancée aloud would probably send Stiles into an apoplexy.

“Derek,” the Sheriff greeted him, pulling him into a crushing embrace.  There were some nice things about having his boyfriend’s father lost in a fluffy pink cloud of romance.  There had been a noticeable lack of menacing posturing lately.  He wasn’t inclined to push it though, much to Stiles chagrin.  And a small part of Derek that was both sadistic and needy enjoyed watching Stiles squirm for not being able have sex with him.

“Sir.”

“And of course you remember Jennifer.”

“Jen.”

“Derek.”

They hugged and exchanged cheek kisses.  He had to admit he really liked her.  She was just so…nice, the very picture the young English professor she was, and so very _normal_. The Sheriff had met her at Town Hall while she was trying to get access to some rare manuscripts for her research.  Stilinski had helped her submit the paperwork and that was that, although the distance between UCSF and Beacon Hills had been something of an obstacle, especially now that school was starting again.

Derek managed to keep it off his face when it clicked in his head.  “Come on in.  We’re just setting the table now.”  He’d gotten good at controlling how much of his emotions flowed through the Packnet but keeping _this_ out of it was going to be a _nightmare_.

“Oh, honey, we forgot the-

“Food, right, I’ll get it from the car.”  The Sheriff gave her a quick peck on the lips and hurried out.

“I’m afraid I’m not much of a cook, but made of batch of my infamous cookies and a pitcher of my mother’s sangria.”

If only alcohol affected him.  “Infamous cookies?”

She laughed.  “Infamous among my girlfriends.  These babies are the ultimate comfort food and have been behind the post-breakup weight gains for half my old social circle.”

Aha!  Her _old_ social circle.  “You can never have too many deserts at a table with seven teenagers,” he said.  She had been very accepting of their bizarre extended family unit.  They’d cast themselves as a group bound together by the shared experience of lost or absentee parents, and being the compassionate sort she had simply congratulated them on finding one another.

“Here we are,” the Sheriff said sweeping back in bearing a pitcher that was practically a keg in one hand and a saran wrapped platter of cookies the size of a coffee table in the other.  Derek didn’t know if it was Jen or extra the extra power he got from being pack, but the Sheriff was moving like a much younger man these days.  Hell, he even _looked_ about a decade younger.

“Follow me.”

“Your home is breathtaking, Derek,” Jen complimented as he led them back to the dining room.

“I like my space, but I’m from a big family so…”  He left that to be interpreted how she would.

“Plus Stiles and Lydia absconded with his credit card, some architectural software, and the keys to Mrs. Martin’s interior design firm,” the Sheriff added causing Jen to laugh delightedly.

“There’s drinks laid out on the sideboard.  I’ll take these,” he said relieving the Sheriff of his burdens, “and put them in the kitchen.”  He called in the pack over the ‘net to entertain their guests while he went to put away the food and check on Stiles.

His boyfriend was assaulting a huge bowl of salad that had passed well tossed a while ago.  At least until he caught the scent of the refreshments.

“Look cookies,” he said at the same time Stiles said “Oh thank God, alcohol.”  The pitcher leapt out Derek’s and into Stiles’s, who began chugging it like a man three days lost in the desert.

“Maybe you want to slow down?  Or not.” He retracted when he saw the slightly manic scarlet glare over through the glass of the rapidly emptying container.  To be fair there was some left when Stiles put it on the counter with a crystalline _thunk_.

“Better.  Let’s do this.”

 

It went…well enough.  In large part because Jen’s sangria apparently had a whale of a kick.  Stiles seemed to have completely forgotten his issues with her.  The only supernatural close call came when Scott asked him to pass the salt and the shaker zipped across the table cloth on its own, but Peter distracted her just in time.  His Uncle’s behavior was easily the most shocking part of the night, completely absent of any indicators of psychosis.

Of course, they narrowly avoided a perfectly mundane train wreck when it came time for the big reveal.

The easy conversation around the table faded when the Sheriff stood clinking a fork against his glass.  “Thank you, Derek, for having us here tonight, and you Melissa for preparing this delicious meal.

“I’m getting a new mommy for desert!” Stiles whispered in his ear.  The seventeen year old was grinning like a fool and glassy-eyed and little bit tipsy.  Maybe more than a little since he’d forgotten that everyone at the table besides Jen had enhanced hearing.  Every member of the pack who was mid-swallow began to choke and sputter, but luckily managed to avoid a full-on spit take.

The Sheriff gave his son microsecond long death glare but continued undaunted “As some of you know, Jennifer and I have an announcement to make.”  He paused for dramatic effect, making a show of realizing he’d something wrong.  “Actually, I suppose you should all get used to calling her Ms. Blake because she’s moving to Beacon Hills and accepting a job in the English department at your school.”

The pack’s reactions ranged from nothing whatsoever (Cora), to evil grins (Jackson and Peter), to polite interest (Melissa, Danny, and Lydia), to poorly suppressed laughter (Isaac, Erica, and Boyd), to worried side-eyed glances at Stiles (Scott, and himself).  Everyone remembered to applaud politely.  Everyone except Stiles.

“Woooo!  That’s a load off!  I was afraid you were going to tell us that you…uh…were…uh…being indicted for…jaywalking.”  He buried his face in his glass, chugging his water to drown out the silent but still deafening chorus of “Jaywalking?  Really, Stiles?” 

Even Jen radiated dry amusement “I’m glad you approve of me, Stiles.”

“Aw you’re the best Miss Bleak.  Mass Black.  Mrs. Blake.  Mzzzzzzzzz. Blake.  Ha!  My tongue tickles.”

“That hot mess sits at Derek’s left and I’m all the way down here?” Jackson snarked.

Derek hadn’t meant for ranked seating to happen at pack dinners.  He blamed it on the ridiculous chair he sat in at the head of the table.  Lydia had begun training under Deaton to become the pack’s emissary and had insisted on the elaborately carved oak monstrosity that resembled nothing so much as throne.  Then again, from the wicked gleam in Peter’s eyes it was possible his Uncle was behind this.  Derek sat at the head of the table with Stiles to his left and Scott on his right, their parents next to them in the positions of honor (Jen of course was in the Sheriff’s usual seat, pushing that side down one seat).  Erica, Boyd, and Jackson filled out the left, while Isaac, Lydia, Danny, and Cora took up the right, leaving Peter opposite Derek at the foot of the table as the Pack Elder.

The Sheriff’s expression turned thoughtful as his eyes swept up and down the table considering Jackson’s comment.  Derek sensed another werewolf Q & A on the horizon.  But for now he just said “Derek, why don’t you take Stiles to lie down for a while, we’ll finish up here.”

Before he could reply Stiles had draped himself over Derek’s lap and slung his arms around his neck, quite a feat considered the huge arms of the Abomi-Chair.  “You wanna…lie down…with me?” he slurred (not) lasciviously with a waggle of his eyebrows.

It was adorable but not exactly enticing given that his breath was nearly flammable and reeked of greene chiles and cilantro.  “I’ll take care of him,” he said, hefting Stiles into his arms as he stood (“Wheeeeee!”)

“Yeah he’s gonna take of me.” 

The pack was no longer bothering to suppress their guffaws as he carried him up the stairs to the master suite.  Derek laid Stiles on his (their) king size bed, pulling of his shoes and tossing them aside.

“I zink sat went retty kay, you?”

“Shhhhh.”  Derek smoothed Stiles hair off his forehead to place a kiss on it.  “Sleep.  You’ll need to get up early so you can fix your hangover before school.”

“You betcha!”  Stiles arms made it halfway to a double thumbs up before his face went slack and his limbs flopped bonelessly onto the bed.

He stood there for a long moment shaking his head and watching Stiles snore.  This really shouldn’t be so cute, but maybe the Sheriff wasn’t the only one floating around in a fluffy haze.  He turned off the light and closed the door behind him.  Stiles would have a hell of a headache once he’d slept it off and Derek wanted to make sure he stashed some of Jen’s cookies for him before the school of werepiranha downstairs reduced them to scattered crumbs.  Besides, he was the host and needed to see the happy couple, the _other_ happy couple, to the door.

Again he found himself wondering how this was his life.  But this time it was ask how he could have gotten so lucky.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Stiles woke to a scent like the back alley behind a Mexican restaurant and jerked upright when he realized it was coming from the puddle of drool he was passed out in.

“Morning,” Derek said from the doorway.  The man was wearing a tank top and pair of running shorts, both rendering nearly transparent with sweat from one of his crazy five a.m. workouts.  Stiles had learned very quickly that his control over his teenage libido did not extend to watching his boyfriend lift weights without jumping him.  And the time he walked in on Derek doing yoga?  It had been two days before the pack could bear for the two of them to be within ten feet of each other without covering their noses to block out the scent of arousal and yelling “Stiles!”

Right now the scent coming off his lover was torture.  All those post exercise endorphins plus the smell of happy-satisfied-tired and just a tidal wave of pure _Derek_ were saturating the air, making his visibly awkward morning situation all that much…harder to ignore.

“Two months, Der,” he groaned, “ it’s been two months since we’ve had sex and you are _not_ allowed to stand there smelling like that.  You better go shower before I succumb to my baser desires and…”  He flicked wrist his and those hateful shorts leapt down around Derek’s ankles, revealing a tight bright red jockstrap that was coming under strain as they flirted.  The man looked down at himself and shrugged unselfconsciously before stripping off his tank top, dropping it in and the shorts in the hamper as he walked into the adjoining master bath.  Stiles nearly sprang after him like a cheetah on a gazelle as he watched Derek’s bare, ridiculously hot ass slink past, closing the door behind him.

Stupid red jockstrap.  Derek knew Stiles loved him in that color but refused to let any of the brood out of his wardrobe.  Except for his underwear, which the evil bastard wore because he wanted him to suffer.  It was like he’d written “property of Stiles” on his ass and Stiles didn’t have to be a werewolf to experience the warm curl of possessive satisfaction at seeing that declaration.

When shower came on in the other room Stiles focused on his hearing knowing what was coming next.  While they certainly weren’t having sex, not even touching below the waist, it wasn’t true that they were doing _nothing_.  Super senses were an advantage here.  He jumped up and locked the bedroom door before stripping off his shirt and shimmying out of his jeans.  He looked at his reflection in the mirror over the dresser.  Gone was the lanky kid from a few months ago.  He might not have Derek’s build but hey look, _muscles_. 

He flopped back on the bed and listened to Derek clean himself off.  To his ears every slip of skin on skin, every contented sigh, every hiss of pleasure when something sensitive was brushed lightly was as clear as if Stiles was the causing it.  This was a game they played regularly but today Derek wasn’t in the mood to drag things out.  Stiles knew it when he heard the click of the bottle of lube that they kept in with the soap and shampoo.

He grabbed himself and started jerking off slowly, listening and imagining.  In his mind he watched as Derek slid his left hand languorously up and down his length while his right reached behind.  He saw those thick fingers slide in between his cheeks to lightly tease the perfect pink pucker of muscle nestled between them.  Stiles focused so hard on their connection over the ‘net that he could practically feel it when Derek slipped the first finger in.  After only a few seconds of working it in and out he added a second, stifling an ecstatic moan as he curled them into the perfect position to rub over just the right spot with thrust.

Stiles began pulling at himself almost frantically while he listened to his lover do the same in the shower.  Derek came less than a minute later and the scent of his release flooding the steam curling under the bathroom door was all it took to push Stiles over the edge as well.  He lay there spent and sticky until Derek emerged.

“Your turn,” he said.  “You have school in less than hour so you’d better hurry.”

Right.  School.  _Balls_.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“Oh my God!  Are you alright?  Was Allison hurt?  Scott must be losing his mind!”  Stiles was never drinking again.  There was no excuse for  being passed out drunk while his pack was getting attacked by psychotic deer.

“Please, we were fine, just a little shaken up.  You on the other hand might want to calm down; stress is terrible for hangovers.”

“I’m not hungover,” he grumbled.  He left out the part how it was impossible to get a hangover in the manor, the healing charms prevented it.  Lydia was way too smart and would realize the implications of that and Stiles wasn’t ready to broach the subject with the pack just yet.

“It was just a deer in the road, it happens,” she said dismissively.

“I don’t know Lyds.  Did you hear about Deaton’s clinic?  Mass animal suicide?  This is like omens and shit.”

“Don’t be so dramatic.”

He _was_ being dramatic and he knew it.  But ever since Chicago, and especially since the New Moon, he had been having a sense of waiting menace.  It didn’t seem to be directed at the pack but still. It couldn’t bode well for the territory.

A mass text preceded Jen, er…Ms. Blake into the room.  Stiles didn’t know if it was because she’d plied him with sangria and the most amazing white chocolate macadamia nut cookies ever, or if he’d just finally got whatever it was out of system by being a drunken tool at dinner, but his lingering misgivings about the woman had finally evaporated.  Hell, maybe it was just because she was so damn _likable_.  Even _Derek_ seemed have a little bit of a crush on her much to Stiles’s amusement.

While she started into the usual welcome back here’s our curriculum spiel the sense of menace intensified until a feeling of wrongness permeated the air to such an extent it was nearly tangible.

Lydia looked over at him brow furrowed.  Her normal arcane senses were better than his (it was a function of raw power and everyone had more of that than him, sigh) and she too had a supersensory charm that extended into magical spectra, but he could tell she wasn’t feeling it like he was.  Soon the whole pack was at attention sensing Stiles rising distress.

He was just about to start thinking he was losing his mind when he heard the birds.  Outside hundreds of huge black crows were winging towards the school, their combined terror so great is was palpable even through the room’s windows.  Windows that were regular glass unlike those at the manor, and wouldn’t hold up under an avian kamikaze run.

“Stiles can you…” she trailed off indicating the windows.  They’d gotten an advance warning sure but still only had moments to act.

He snorted hysterically, shaking his head.  Yeah, right.  He couldn’t reinforce a twenty foot _wall_ of windows.

“Uh, Ms. Blake?” he asked cutting off Jen’s lecture.

“Yes mister Stilinski?”  Her expression was clearly worried that Stiles was descending into full teen drama mode over his Dad’s new girlfriend and had decided to disrupt class because of it.

He kinda wished that _was_ it as he pointed at the inbound flock.

Jen’s jaw dropped open when she saw the birds but couldn’t seem to find any _words_. 

Fuck it he had to do something, there was only seconds left.  He focused on the fire alarm and watched as the little handle flipped down, releasing the familiar flood of light and sound.

“Alright everybody please exit the room quickly and calmly,” Jen said waving the class to the door.

Only a couple of kids had gotten through the door before pandemonium erupted as the windows shattered admitting a feathered tempest into the room in a shower of broken glass.

In a flash Stiles and Lydia had grabbed Jen and pulled her down to relative safety behind the desk while forcibly diverting and birds or shards or students that threatened to impact them.  Once the last dazed and bleeding class member had scrambled out into the hall Stiles yelled “Go, go, go!” thrusting the heel of a palm forward and sending sweeping ace of invisible energy through the air, scattering the nearest birds.  They kept low as they bolted for the door, Stiles slamming it shut behind them for good measure.

“So Jen,” he said abandoning decorum, “how are you liking our sleepy little town so far?”  If not all the tears glistening her eyes were from her answering laughter he wasn’t going to be the one to bring it up.  There was no way she’d missed him throwing magic around and even if she had Stiles had been able to see the red glow of his eyes reflected in her shocked brown ones.  His Dad was going to _kill_ him.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“So you’re a werewolf,” Jen said to which he simply nodded.  She was still shaken up after having her classroom destroyed on her first day but was handling her abrupt transition into the world of the supernatural better than anyone he’d seen save Stiles.  “And you’re…telekinetic?” she asked the younger Stilinski.  He opened his mouth but closed it again, settling for a shrug of confirmation instead, the full explanation would take too much time for right now.  “And you’re okay with this?” she asked the Sheriff. Thankfully her tone implied concern for Stiles’s and Derek’s welfare instead of concern that the underage teen would be taken advantage of and then _eaten_.

“Okay is strong word for it.” Stilinski muttered.  “Neither of my boys _chose_ this it’s just how they were born,” he said sternly, almost daring her to impose judgment.  Derek meanwhile was trying not to melt into a puddle of goo at the Sheriff calling him his son, fur, issues, and all.

“It’s fine,” she said placing a hand on the Sheriff’s arm, “just a lot to take in.”  And how.

“I think this awesome,” Stiles said after a moment of silence.  “Now everybody knows everything, or at least has no secrets.  And you’ve already met the rest of the pack.  Although, you’ll probably want to stay away from Peter; he’s gonna want mess with you for fun.”

Derek’s instinctive reaction to defend his Uncle fizzled at the sight Jen’s nervous reaction to that.  Perhaps she hadn’t been as taken in by the older man’s cordial facade as he’d thought.  That reminded him “We will need to give a crash course, on current events if nothing else, and the Full Moon is almost here, when the usual hazards of hanging around with werewolves are magnified significantly.”

“I see,” she said evenly.  She must have been spending enough time around the Sheriff to pick up some of the man’s mannerisms and idiosyncrasies because her reply caused an immediate reaction in Stiles.  He bounded out of the room without being asked and returned a moment later with a tall glass of whiskey for her.  “Oh, perfect,” she said, accepting from Stiles and tossing back with preamble. 

Even the Sheriff looked impressed.  “Stiles how about you just grab the bottle and two, no three more glasses.  We have a lot to go over and there’s no time like the present.”

Derek definitely agreed with that sentiment.  Too many times he had found out after the fact that there was no time _but_ the present for those close to him.  In this case forewarned was forearmed. “This begins with my family…”


	3. Red Right Hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Full Moon arrives and Deucalion unleashes his master plan for Stiles and his pack!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!!WARNING!!!
> 
> Major Character Death in this chapter, plus violence, gore, references to non-con, and Dark Stiles.
> 
> This fic only has fifteen kudos so I'm officially writing for me now.
> 
> BTW, I know A LOT of game changing stuff happens here and it's only the third chapter. I'm building towards a shamelessly overblown conclusion. Should be fun!
> 
> Also, not edited. this chapter ran waaaaay long and I'm done to the wire just getting it up on time.

 Derek had…a feeling.  The kind of feeling the hero in a thriller gets when they walk into their house during the climax and realize they’d forgotten to lock the back door when they went chasing after what was now obviously a red herring and the real killer was sneaking up behind them with a butcher knife.  With moonrise only hours away the intensifying power of the Full Moon made it _impossible_ to ignore.

“Go through it again.  I still think we’re missing something,” he admonished an increasingly frustrated trio of Boyd, Erica, and Cora.  Their captivity had not been easy on their nerves, plus the moon was dialing the strain they were feeling up to eleven and it showed.

“There’s nothing to “go through”, Derek,” Cora snarled.  “We sat around in a dusty old bank.  The end.  Every day was exactly the same; nothing interesting ever happened, okay?”  She got to her feet and started pacing while she flicked her claws in and out one at a time.  “Can we go?  I haven’t had a Full Moon run in months and I’m crawling out of my skin.”

There it was!  “What about the last three Full Moons?  Did they keep you locked up together?”  Something was very wrong with this, something about Erica’s wounds when they’d found her.

Cora stopped pacing suddenly, looking confused.  “I-I think so?”  She turned to look at the other two.

Boyd just shrugged.

“I don’t remember any Full Moons at all.  When you guys found us I kind of wondered if I’d exaggerated how long they kept us in my mind or something.”

 _Mind_.  Of, course.  It wasn’t about _Erica’s_ injuries when they’d found them, it was about all of their injuries.  Or rather the one all three had shared: the claw-punctures on the back of their necks.  Just like Derek had accidentally marked Jackson with, linking them like Peter had with Scott that time in the locker room (and damn but did he wish he could burn that sentence and the images it conjured out of his brain).  It was about _memory_.

He opened his mouth to call Stiles but the enchanter was there before he could speak, drawn by the alarmed “Eureka!” he was putting out over the ‘net.  “What’s up?”

“I need you to check them for mental influence.”

Brilliant as he was it only took him a second to catch on.  “Deucalion’s taunt with the Sticky Note of Doom.  You think they’ve been Manchurian Candidated.”  Derek nodded.  “But I thought that was almost impossible to do to werewolves?”

“Normally it is.  Some of the older wizards could probably pull it off, maybe a vampire if they really pushed it.  Or it can be done by an Alpha.”

“Peter’s freaky Vulcan trick with Scott.”

“Exactly.  Can you find it?”

“If I point you to the ocean and ask you to find me a six-gilled shark could you?  Sometimes I think you forget I’ve been doing this for all of _two months_.  I haven’t even studied mental magic in depth, just the fundamentals for constructing two-way sendings.  This is like asking a Boy Scout at the Pine Wood Derby to service your Ferrari.”

Derek wouldn’t let his enthusiasm/apprehension be stifled.  Since it was the Full Moon and he was still a little high on the power from adding three Betas to the pack he wasn’t sure he could if he tried.  “You don’t have to retool their brains, Stiles.”

“Yes, please don’t,” Boyd said, looking about as close to terror at the thought of Stiles playing around in his head as Derek had ever seen him.

“Seconded,” Cora and Erica said in unison.  He supposed three months locked in a box together had engendered some degree of synchronicity for all that the two girls seemed to avoid each other where possible.

He sighed “Just look _at_ their heads not _in_ their heads and it’ll be fine.”

“Oh.  Yeah, gotcha, coming right up.”

Derek was expecting a little more flash and flare, or at least some pomp and circumstance, but as usual his inner Tolkien-obsessed twelve year old was disappointed.  He’d come to recognize that as good thing, because Stiles’s strange magic was all about taking chaos and browbeating it into order.  Usually it was totally silent and didn’t even make a single hair stand on end.  Giant magical map spells aside, flashing lights and phantoms winds were usually a good indicator that Stiles had gotten carried away on one of his arcane research tangents, and something was about to go horribly wrong in a decidedly… _colorful_ way.

His boyfriend just leaned in towards them one at a time, eyes squinting and moving around like they were following invisible roadmaps.  “Yes,” he said finally.

“Yes?” Erica sneered.  “Is that yes we’ve been given Alphas roofies or yes they’ve implanted bombs in our chests that will detonate if we get within fifty feet of the President.”

“Claws in there, Catwoman.  It’s yes something was done, but I have no idea how or what.”  He looked up at Derek “But there is something I can try.”

“Is it dangerous?” he asked cautiously.

“Not exactly.  If something traumatic rushes back it might be upsetting a bit, but not _dangerous_ like you mean.”

“What is it,” Boyd asked, tacitly manning up and volunteering to be guinea pig.

“This is an Alpha power thing.  I’m an Alpha.  I’ll use my power to weaken the memory bamboozlathing a bit, then use my magic to give it a good shake.  After that your minds should be able to break it down without causing any trouble.”

The Beta’s expression was epically dubious “I guess I’ll give it a try,” he said reluctantly.

“Good” Stiles said with an apologetic smile, “because I got impatient and already did it.”

“Just standing there?” Cora asked incredulously.  She still seemed to harbor some major reservation about the boy Derek had taken to be his “mate” (he sworn multiple amputations on her if she _ever_ used that term where _Stiles_ could hear, dear God the puns).

“I totally kick ass, duh.  BTW you doing okay there Big Guy?”

“Still don’t entirely believe you did anything.”

“Well, now all three of you can doubt me together.  See, it’s fun to share.  Maybe later…”  His head snapped up, eyes narrowing as he concentrated on one the dozens of enchantments he’s worked into the house and the nearby forest.  “Perimeter alarm.  Something Wicked this Fae comes.”

“Zea?”

Stiles shook his head “Not til tomorrow.  Besides, the signature is different it’s…tiny and… _fast_.  Holy crap!  It’s almost at the-

_Ding Dong_

-door.”  A few seconds later Stiles’s brow unfurrowed “It’s gone.”

“A messenger you think?” Derek asked.

“Uh, I know we’ve been out of the loop for a while but what just happened and why is _Stiles_ the one doing the Lassie act?” Erica demanded.

“Because he’s Batman,” Boyd drawled.

“It was probably a faerie messenger.  They’re small and quick enough to carry a letter to the door without setting off my defenses or provoking a general call to arms.  Let’s go see.”

As a group they left the study and marched through the house to the foyer to find Lydia closing the door, sealed envelope held out from her body at a cautious distance.  “It’s for you, Stiles.  I don’t sense anything untoward, magical, chemical, explosive, toxic, or otherwise.”

“See?  Aren’t you glad we didn’t kill her now?” Erica asked, her old mean girl attitude in fully resurrected from its oh so timely grave.  “She can play K-9 cop to Stiles Lassie.  It could be puppy love.”

“I doubt it,” Cora said joining in and giving Lydia an appraising once over.  “I hear she’s after one of the Alpha twins.

“Which one?” Boyd asked, “Tweedle Twink or Tweedle Twunk?”

“Definitely Twunk, Danny’s called dibs on Twink.”

Stiles coughed, waving the missive I the air “Uh, hello?  Magical Owl Post over here.”  Erica rolled her eyes and made a “move along” gesture.

Derek watched as he slowly turned the unopened envelope over in his hands.  The stationary was expensive, heavy, and looked like it might be custom.  On one side “ **Alpha Failbe Stilinski** ” was written in scarlet ink in a flowing calligraphy.  It was sealed with wax of the same shade showing a stylized device like a crescent moon piercing an Eye of Horus.  Stiles broke the seal and pulled out the letter: a single piece of heavy paper, possibly even parchment, with more of that blood red calligraphy, which Stiles read aloud.

 

**Honored Viscount of Beacon Hills,**

**My name is Deucalion.  You may have heard of me and I have most certainly heard of you.  I ask that you come meet me tonight before moonrise at the coffee shop on fifth to discuss terms.  As a show of good faith I have allowed the safe return of three of your own.  Come alone and I guarantee your safety as diplomatic envoy under the terms of the accords, thus my word is given.  Any others that dare approach will be dealt with, harshly.  I look forward to our most profitable negotiations.**

**Sincerely,**

**Your Brother Deucalion**

While there was some snickering over their shared title, by the end there wasn’t a glimmer of amusement to be found on any face of the pack.  Every member currently in the house had drifted in to listen while Stiles read.  When he finished he folded the letter back up, put in its envelope, and handed it to Derek with a grim, stony look carved onto his face.  “I need to leave right now if I’m going to be on time.”

The pack erupted in protests but Derek merely nodded at Stiles, recognizing the implacable sense of resolution coming from him.  It was a feeling he knew well.

They were finally about to get some answers.  They just had to let Stiles walk into a trap set by the world’s most powerful and ruthless Alpha.  And the Full Moon was rising. He didn’t care how hot it was, he was wearing the spelled red leather jacket.  That way even if he died he was going out in style.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The idea of a blind Alpha werewolf might have made some people confused, hell some idiots would probably laugh right in the man’s face.  If any ever actually had Stiles was sure they were super dead right now.  The man sitting across from him wasn’t overtly intimidating, unless fashionably fitted sweaters and designer sunglasses were the sort of thing to make you shake in your Prada boots (he made a mental note to ask Lydia about it later).  All in all he looked more like a wealthy art dealer than the leader of an entire pack of Alphas.

At least that’s how Stiles imagined other people saw him.  There were times when his arcane senses and Alpha power had a way of combining in his perceptions, sometimes allowing him to see things that a werewolf or a wizard alone would miss. 

This was one of them.

To Stiles Deucalion felt like a thunderhead, one of those vast supercell storms from the Midwest that would drift over the plains, swallowing every last shred of energy in the atmosphere before unleashing its fury in a maelstrom of lighting, softball sized hail, and an F5 cyclone.  The kind of storm that turned whole towns into little piles of matchsticks.

He found himself fighting the urge to squeak out a goodbye and beat it back to the safety of the manor and hide under Derek.  Well, half of him was.  The Alpha in him was furious.  The Moon had never had any particular affect on him but the unnatural tidal pull coming from the leader of the Alpha Pack was something he could feel in his bones, and part of him was furious that this _creature_ was defiling his territory just by being in it.  Deucalion’s power was corrupt, a ravenous darkness that threatened to consume all it touched.

The silent assessment of him made him smile like a shark “Now that we have been properly introduced it’s time to discuss my terms.”

Stiles had been worried about this ever since he’d read the invitation.  He knew he’d be a fool that to assume Deucalion did anything that didn’t have a specific purpose and precise execution.  Asking for a meeting to discuss “terms and negotiations” in such a friendly voice?  Calling him brother?  It was a masterfully crafted delivery of the old “easy way/hard way” trope, and no less troubling for being clichéd.

“The terms of what, exactly?”

“Why your surrender of course.”  The man smiled around his cup of espresso like they were talking about the weather, the smarmy jerk.

“I didn’t realize we were at war.”  Crap. He’d come here for one reason: to fish for information.  He had to try and drag this out.  “After all, I can’t imagine you’d see a bunch of high school students as a much of a threat.”

“Oh I’ve always been a man of vision.  It’s a quality you and I share.”

“I don’t share anything with you, _brother_ ,” he seethed.

“No?  Well let’s take a look at what you’ve done in the last year.  You discovered and trained the first True Alpha in over a century, executed Peter Hale and elevated his Nephew to the position of Alpha, and successfully eradicated a rogue Kanima.  That would be a promising start for a young emissary.”

“All lot of that stuff didn’t really happen like that.  Besides I’m not an emissary.”

“No, indeed you’re not.  No emissary has ever done what you have, claiming the power the pack they serve as their own and placing themselves at its head.  And all without taking the Bite, too.”

“Like.  I.  Said.  That’s not how it happened.”  He was starting to get angry now.  If he couldn’t control his temper this was going to go downhill fast.  Losing his cool in front of Deucalion would be a literally fatal display of weakness.

“How it happened is of far less consequence than the simple fact that it did, and all according to your will.   All that will lacks is a design to realize.  I’m prepared to offer that to you.”

“All this cloak and dagger for the ye olde “join up or die” speech, seriously?” he scoffed even as a ball of ice formed in the pit of his stomach.  Whatever had originally drawn their focus to Beacon Hills, he had become its subject.  The pack was in danger because of _him_.

“Hardly.  You are more valuable piece to leave in play even if I can’t be the hand that moves you.”

Stiles was fast approaching livid.  This egomaniac wanted to control him?  Fuck that.  “This isn’t a game,” he snarled, “too many people have died already.  Threaten my pack and I swear to God I will send your ass to join them myself.”

“Me?  You misunderstand, _Failbe_.  I have no intention of killing your pack.”  That smug smile turned hungry and sinister.

“You want me to do it myself,” he said stunned.  The rage was overwhelming.  It was burning him up from the inside.  Burning like the thin swath of moonlight peeking over the trees.  _Burning along the Packnet_.  The rage _wasn’t his_ , it was being transmitted from Cora, Boyd, and Erica, and if Stiles was this close to losing it then the wolves were in serious danger of coming completely unhinged under the combined influence of the Full Moon.  “We’re done.”  He jumped to his feet and threw some bills down on the table.  “It’s on me.”

“Go attend to your pack.  We’ll meet again soon; I’ve quite enjoyed our little chat.”

Stiles used the horror he felt at the implications of that statement and his overwhelming fear for his pack to isolate the foreign emotions in his mind and center himself around a single purpose: saving them.

If it a purpose he hoped to fulfill he was going to have to hurry,

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“Do you remember anything yet?” Derek asked impatiently.  The Moon was moments away and the three Betas were shaking with it.  Something was very, very wrong.  He’d brought them out into the woods with him to shift in the small clearing they used as a base for outdoor training where they were less likely to cause damage.  Stiles had tried to convince him to keep some more of the pack with him but Scott had sided with Derek and taken the rest with him to shadow Stiles.

“No,” Cora snarled.  “I don’t know what happened on the Full Moons.”

“Wait,” Boyd said shaking his head like he was trying to clear the rising anger out, “I remember a word.  It was about the bank.  Something special about it.  Something about marble?”   That hardly seemed important enough to go through all this trouble to hide.

“No, not marble,” Erica corrected, “they called it something else.  Hematite?  Hermaphrodite?”

“Hecatalite?” Derek asked eyes narrowed.  To humans, Hecatalite was a rare and expensive type of Greek marble with streaks of iridescent silver running through it.  In the supernatural world it was known for its power to scatter and diffuse moonlight and had famously been used to construct the temple of the dark Moon Goddess Hecate, hence the name.

Cora gasped then growled “Derek!”  She was started to have trouble remaining coherent.  “the reason we don’t remember what we did on the Full Moons is that we didn’t do _anything_.  The vault was surrounded by solid blocks of the stuff.”

“But that means…” he trailed off in horrified realization.  When they shifted it would unleash four moons worth of suppressed power and rage.  There would be no controlling them.

Cora fell to her knees “Derek, run!”

“No!  Come on, we have to get you back to the house, to the safe rooms.”  They were in bad shape.  Just feeling it along the ‘net was nearly unseating his own control.  He thought about the house, the promise of safety there, and _Stiles_.  The wolf receded enough to focus.

When they got to the edge of the forest they were stopped by the invisible pressure of a Mountain Ash circle.

They had been set up.  Oh God _no_.

Two figures shimmered into sight as a concealing veil fell away, incidentally revealing the circle of Ash that had been cloaked from sight and smell.  They were well and truly fucked.

“Does this conclude our bargain to your satisfaction?” Zea asked in his human form.

“It most certainly does,” smiled a female Alpha.  Her feet were bare and black-clawed like her hands, and her fanged smile was predatory.  Derek knew her by reputation.

“Kali.  And you,” he snarled at the faerie, “I’m gonna tear your throat out.  With my teeth.”

“I am sorry, Viscount Hale, but I’m afraid I have sold Stiles debt to another and she…” the unicorn shuddered nervously, “she would prefer it Deucalion’s plans went forward for now.  Much as our contest might be entertaining I’m afraid this the last time we shall meet.”  Zea bowed to him respectfully and gave Kali a curt nod before fading into the night.

“Well well well, the Derek Hale.  I’m surprised and a little disappointed.  I was expecting so much more from Talia’s son.”

He knew she was baiting him and shoved down the howl of rage that threatened to tear free at the mention of his mother.  Meanwhile his Betas had shifted and fallen to their knees where they huddled together within the spread of Derek’s outstretched arms, trying to hold on to their sanity.

“What?   Nothing to say?  I would have thought that mouthy little kitchen witch you’ve been dating would have rubbed off on you by now.”  Her eyes widened in mock realization.  “Oh that’s right, there’s no rubbing off going on between at all, I heard about that.  You just make moon eyes at him while takes over your pack.  Honestly. I can see why Duke decided to go after him instead of you.”  Her face twisted up like she’d put her nose in something foul.  “You’re a joke of an Alpha.  But don’t worry I’ll make sure he doesn’t stay lonely for too long after your Betas tear you apart, show him what a real wolf is like,” she said with a lascivious smirk.

“Stiles is mine bitch.”  He was teetering on the point of no return now and Kali was watching avidly, visibly loving every second of it which only added impotent rage to the fire that burning inside him.  “Go.  Run.  I’ll give you a head start before I chase you down and rip you apart.”

“You thought I was talking about me?” she asked placing a hand on her chest.  “Oh no.  Deucalion won’t let anyone touch Stiles.  You had no idea the prize you had did you?  Too bad.”  She leaned in as close as the circle would allow, her voice falling to a whisper.  “At least you won’t have to see it, to watch as Duke claims him for his own.  You won’t be around when he takes him as _mate_ , forces him to _submit_.”

“Stop it!” he howled.  He _had_ to hold on, but he’d never wanted anything in his life more than he wanted to get free and claw Kali’s smug face into _ribbons_.

Her smile became triumphant “You’ll be _powerless_ to stop it when he makes him his _bitch_ ,” she purred.

Derek self-control shattered like a diamond struck at the wrong angle, his roar of rage tearing away the last shreds of humanity from his Betas as his Alpha shape erupted out of his skin with intent to tear and rip and slash.

Kali’s mocking laughter followed him down as he was swallowed whole, blacking out as the wolf took full control.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Stiles pulled at the threads of the Packnet as he dashed out of the shop but it was useless, completely overwhelmed by the rage that grew each time another member of the pack succumbed to it like a rapidly spreading infection.

He would have to follow his nose instead.  Scott had the most control and had Lydia there to watch his back to advise him.  Deucalion had set up the meeting specifically to make sure he was tense and angry when the Moon rose so he wouldn’t see the trap until it was too late, but Lydia was smart and focused, she would have picked up on it much sooner.

Stiles stopped for a moment to try and puzzle out her next move.  She wouldn’t have stayed in a populated area, too much risk of collateral damage.  She would have found some place contained that also had a lot of space to maneuver that would be closed this early at night.  He tilted his head back and inhaled deeply, hoping his nose would provide some inspiration.  The pack had been circling, keeping a loose perimeter which made it hard to know which way to start, but he got the sense that their scents were freshest to the south.

 _South_.  Just like that he knew: she’d gone to the Beacon Hills Public Library. “Yes!  That’s my beautiful, devious strawberry blond _Goddess_!” he yelled aloud.  Some of the passersby looked at him strangely (it was still early after all and he was standing smack dab in the middle what passed for downtown there), but his reputation as the eccentric son of the Sheriff had grown to the heights of infamy after the whole Jackson/Kanima van-napping incident, and most people who recognized him would just shake their heads and keep going when they caught him doing something weird.  It was ruse he’d quickly learned to rely on while dealing with the inevitable colorful chaos that came with being a newbie at magic.

The Library was significant to Stiles for other reasons, things he hadn’t even talked to Derek about yet, but Lydia had gone on research binges with him there and he hadn’t been able to hide them from her.  His mother had volunteered there in the afternoons when Stiles was a kid and it was the place that became his sanctuary for the first few months after she died.  It was a coded message from Lydia that they were in peril beyond simple mortal danger.  He looked in the direction he knew the manor lay, desperately hoping that his boyfriend and their three Betas that had been used like Trojan Horses were alright. 

 

Almost as soon as he’d started towards the Library he caught the scents of not one but three unfamiliar Alphas.  Assuming Deucalion didn’t intend on wading into the fray himself, which seemed likely given his obvious Evil Mastermind vibe, that meant only one other Alpha had gone after Derek.  Poor guy would be so jealous if Stiles got three to his one.

As soon as he got to the Library he ran around to the loading dock to find the back door pried open as he’d expected.  So far so good.  He sprinted down the hall, through the stacks, and into the large open area that once held the rows of computers and the circulation desk.  Things had changed since his last visit.  The floor had been cleared, creating as big of a clear spot as the room allowed.   Filling every available inch of space was an enormous High Magic Circle, the rings and symbols painted in what smelled like a mixture of red paint, Mountain Ash, pig’s blood, and a few other things he really didn’t want to identify.  He just wished he knew what the damn thing was _for._

His pack and the Alphas were both inside.  Scott lay on the ground absolutely _covered_ in wounds, his clothes in tatters and stained with black blood.  Stiles wanted to rush right to his side but he would first have to deal with the spectacle the Alpha pack was making of tormenting his friends.  Tweedle Twink and Tweedle Twunk were holding a struggling feral Danny and a bound and gagged Lydia respectively.  So much for those budding romances.  Isaac was currently fighting another Alpha the size of a professional wrestler.

No, fighting wasn’t the right word.  Isaac, who was just as gone as Danny, was being toyed with for sport.  Stiles had never really tried to force a member of his back to do something by drawing on his status as Alpha, but these chuckleheads weren’t his pack.  Not now, not ever, and fuck you very much, Douchecalion.  “STOP!” he cried, putting every ounce of power he had into the command.  They stopped.  Stiles wasn’t going to kid himself, it wasn’t that were cowed by his unquestionable authority and general awesomeness.  It looked more like they’d felt the command, ignored it, and were curious about the human kid that could speak as an Alpha.

It was the giant who spoke first “Ah, the guest of honor, now the party can start.”  He grabbed Isaac and nodded at Twunk, who let Lydia fall to the ground like a sack of meal, and accepted the exhausted but still struggling Beta instead.  “Duke said we couldn’t kill you, but I didn’t come back to this nightmare town to sit around while you two play chess and quip at each other.  I brought something for you.”  He gestured a narrow object wrapped in red velvet on the floor just outside the circle.  Stiles slowly walked over and picked it up, carefully unwrapping it to reveal a rowan wood practice sword, one he recognized.

“Zea,” he murmured aloud.  “That’s how you knew how to set all this up.  He’s the only one outside the pack who knew enough. You struck a bargain and he told you everything you needed.”  He gripped the treacherous unicorn’s training weapon so hard it began to creak.

“They said you were smart.  Here’s the deal: lose the rings, take the stick and face me.  If you win, I let all of you go.  If you lose, I let you go but the rest of your pack dies.  Understand?”

Stiles nodded mutely, keeping his wicked grin off his face.  Ha! He didn’t know about the spells on the jacket, or just what he could do with the blunt instrument, because Zea hadn’t seen him practice with the werewolves. 

He took off his rings and set them on the ground, pulling a pinch of his own Mountain Ash out his pocket and sealing them off from gabby werewolves.  But once he stepped into the circle he a got another lesson in the differences between born wolves and bitten wolves (or in his case magically enhanced humans).  He’d been so focused of using his senses to gather every detail about the threat in front of him and the condition of his friends he hadn’t noticed or checked for someone waiting in the shadows of the stacks until she stepped out and flicked a hand at the circle, muttering something that sounded like ancient Gallic.  The painted rings and symbols caught fire, the dancing cherry-red flames were only about an inch high and burned heatless, merely staying in place and flickering merrily.

“Ms. Morell?” he asked flabbergasted.

The usually stunning guidance councilor looked haggard and worn, eyes too large.  It was a look Stiles had seen on the faces of some of his Father’s co-workers at the station.  “I’m sorry, Stiles.”  Without further explanation she retreated, heeled boots clacking away from the trap she’d laid for him and out the back the way he’d come in. 

He already knew but had to check anyway.  When he reached out a hand towards the innermost ring of the glyph it impacted a solid barrier that glowed scarlet in air in front of his hand, defining the curve of an invisible cylinder.

Alpha Hogan seemed to decide he’d had enough waiting and threw himself at Stiles with a roar once his back was turned.  He side-stepped, slashing crosswise and caught the werewolf across the small of the back as he flew by.  Contact with the sword, made from the same tree that produce the magical Mountain Ash dust, added to his momentum and sent him flying into the barrier with a flash of violet light, where he rebounded in an answering bloom of crimson.

“Oh dear, it looks like Little Red Roiding Wolf is trapped in a magic cage with Big Bad Boy,” Stiles gibed.  “Looks like he won’t make it to Dukey’s house after all.”

Little Red just laughed at him, and Stiles could practically _hear_ the twins grinning behind him.  The massive wolf slipped two long leather cuffs chased with silver designs onto his arms and stood to face him, confidence in every line of his posture.  Temporarily robbed of his enhanced senses by the loss of his rings, Stiles couldn’t actually see the warding magics the bracers, but even from several feet away he _felt_ them.  For his minimal arcane spider senses to tingle like that those things had to be holding all kinds of power, and there was no way he’d be able to unbind them mid-fight within Morell’s Greater Circle.

He was screwed and he knew it.  There was a time in his life when feeling this scared and helpless would send him right into a panic attack.  To be honest he could feel one building right then.  But instead of dissolving into a quivering mess he grabbed onto the pack’s rage and used it fuel his resolve.  With a yell he launched himself at the Alpha in a furious attack, his only hope to bring him down quickly before injury or exhaustion killed him by attrition.

It was useless.  The combination of the enchanted wood and Stiles magic was a unique frequency and whoever had made those warding cuffs, Zea probably, had designed to counter it specifically.  The damned practice sword stopped dead in the air if it came within six of them.  Stiles was fast and better with a blade than most would guess looking at him, but without the advantage the rowan gave him he might as well have been fighting with a sword made of Styrofoam.

He gave it everything he had anyway.  As he slashed and lunged and stabbed, the Alpha just laughed, making the rage burning inside him rise until his eyes glowed red continuously.  The werewolf never attacked back, just gave ground until they had made it to the far said of the circle where the twins held Isaac and Danny, and Lydia struggled vainly against her bonds, screaming incomprehensibly into her gag.

“ _This_ is what everyone’s so hot and bothered about?  Kid I’m falling asleep on my feet over here.”  He put his clawed hands behind head and yawned expansively, displaying his fangs.  He leaned back like he was stretching, exposing his belly in a taught, curving arch.  “You’ve lost.   Deal with it.  Then you can watch while I gut your friends.  Maybe Aiden would like to keep the pretty one.  She looks… _feisty_.”

Stiles was _so_ done with this overgrown Chihuahua.  “Her hair,” he said gathering everything he had into one last strike, the wood beginning to grow hot in his hands, “is strawberry blond, dumbass.”

He blurred forward with a speed no ordinary could match swinging the sword on the horizontal.  He’ discovered during their daily training sessions as a pack that if he suffused the practice sword with his will the blunt wood would part werewolf flesh like it was a red-hot blade, inflicting searing wounds that would take _hours_ to heal.  If this blow landed it might very well tear the Alpha in half.

Stiles realized too late that he’d fallen for the same trick a second time; he’d been deliberately goaded into the strike.  The sword had barely begun its arc when the Alpha rolled forward past Stiles’s open side as the Twins shoved their captives forward.

The rowan sword did its job, biting through Isaac and Danny’s torsos all the way to the spine.  Stiles was frozen with horror as he watched his friends crumple to floor.

“Well, we had a deal.”  The Alpha pulled a vial of something from his pocket and poured it at the edge of the circle.  The red flames were consumed by a rush of cool blue and winked out, breaking the seal.  “We’ll be in touch.”

The three of them walked out without another word.

The wooden blade clattered to floor as it fell from Stiles’s limp fingers.  He didn’t know how long he stood there lost before Lydia’s muffled but somehow still pervasive wails echoed through the abattoir he’d made out of what had once been his safest place.

No, this wasn’t happening.  There was still time.  He ran back over to where he’d put his rings, which were thankfully untouched.  He shoved them back on and rushed to Danny and Isaac, bypassing Scott for now.  The rowan had basically cauterized the wounds s it made them so there wasn’t much in the way of blood and gore, just a black rough-edged burn about half an inch wide running most of the way around their midsections.  He placed hand on the center of each and focused, never having studied burns but desperate enough to wing it anyway.

But nothing happened.  Even if there was a spark of life remaining they wouldn’t heal now, their werewolf power was gone.  Absorbed into Stiles’s own. 

The room began to spin, his stomach churning as he scrambled away from the bodies towards Lydia, desperate to focus on _anything_ else for a moment.  She wasn’t screaming now, but wide eyes were trying to tell him something as terror rushed out of her in a torrent.  He didn’t bother trying to until the knots but slashed them with focused force. 

She quickly removed the gag for mouth and said “P-Peter,” in a trembling voice.

As soon as Stiles thought of the creepy old werewolf he knew the man was twenty behind and about two seconds shy of actually jumping for joy.  _Because the God damn Packnet had finally started working again_.  As soon as he felt along it the last embers of hope in his heart fizzled and died.  The only werewolves he could feel were Peter and the barely alive Scott.

He stood up and turned to face Peter, already knowing what he would see.  The former Alpha stood there holding a weakly struggling Scott pressed to his front, claws waiting and ready to tear out his best friend’s throat.  “Do you really think I’ll let you leave this room alive if you kill him?” Stiles asked, marveling at how un-Stiles-like his voice sounded.  Cold.  Uninflected.  Empty.

“No, Stiles I don’t,” he purred, his eyes alight with his madness, finally revealed.  “That’s way I’m taking him with me.  I can just barely sense my nephew through this wonderful creation of yours,” he said, removing the stud from Scott’s left ear and flicking it away.  Stiles marked where it fell in his mind while Peter did away with his own earring; Scott was going to need that back in about two minutes.  “Derek must be in bad shape, barely alive even.  You should hurry.”

Peter was right about one thing: Derek was there, barely, but it fanned to life one last spark within him.  That tiny spark touched the vast well of fury that had bubbled up inside him set it alight.  A single word of crimson fire branded itself onto his heart as he poured the energy of the conflagration into his rings: Vengeance.  The madman was wrong.  Stiles had all the time in the world.  Peter was the one whose number was up.

The werewolf had assumed Stiles would attack with invisible force or thrown objects, which is why he was using Scott as a human shield.  But Stiles had learned ways to use his power that would never dream of using.  But that was before tonight.

He reached out with his magic, found Peter’s heart, and crushed it.  The wolf tried to gasp, hands releasing Scott to scrabble at his own chest tearing his shirt and the skin underneath.  His supernatural healing kept trying to repair the damage as Stiles kept up the pressure, forcing Peter to his knees, face purpling.  It looked _excruciating_.  Good.

He walked forward at a relaxed pace, picking up his sword as he went, leaving a silently weeping Lydia behind.  “I could say something right now about how “It didn’t have to be this way” or “I’m sorry it’s come to this” but we both know that would be a lie.”  He stopped in front of the murderer who had begun all of this, dragging his friends into a supernatural nightmare they didn’t deserve.  Seeing him like this didn’t make Stiles feel powerful, or vindicated, just tired.  “In the absence of helpful platitudes I’ll just go with a classic: say hi to Kate for me you son of a bitch.”  His eyes glowed red as he swung, creating a razor edge of force along the blade and cutting Peter in half.  Vertically.  “Come back from that, dick.”

Stiles was exhausted, which might have made it easier to notice the rush of Peter’s strength flowing into him.  The high only lasted a second before the sense of Scott’s presence in his mind began to gutter like a spent wick. Oh God no.

“SCOTT!!!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, what a body count. There is not a happy ending in this story, or in the series really. But I promise the Derek/Stiles part will end in hearts and fluffy things.
> 
> Some things you just don't mess with.


	4. Red is the New Black

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles and Derek mourn in the usual way of young couples and exchange some words.
> 
> Together they try to work out who their true enemies are, even as a new threat with a penchant for ritual murder arises.
> 
> They have a chat with a possible suspect/ally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sexy days are here again (and not going anywhere any time soon).
> 
> The Darach's plans and tactics are different from Canon on purpose due to her much more complex relationship to the main characters.

Derek didn’t want to wake up, it was safer in the dark, but he felt his Alphas in agony calling him back and the imperative was too strong to resist.  Scents came back first.  He was definitely in the manor but not in his own bed.  The smell of Stiles and Scott was all around him, helping to suppress the fetid aroma of old blood that clung to his skin.  Pack blood.  The rush of memory nearly sent him scrambling back towards oblivion in horror, but the sensation of a warm hand on his face kept him from slipping.  He couldn’t stay here, where there was no hiding from he’d done, so he focused on the beating of their three hearts pounding away in perfect unison as always.  It was the most powerful sound in his world, the thing that anchored him, gave him purpose, and promised comfort.

“Derek?  Derek?  It’s time to wake up.”  Stiles’s voice was…wrong.  It was so _cold_.  If he hadn’t been able to sense his emotions, Derek wouldn’t have thought he _had_ any.  It was a maelstrom under an ice shelf and it chilled him more deeply even than the knowledge that members of his own pack, his own _sister_ , had probably died at his hands.

“Stiles?”  His voice was an airy rasp, barely there.  How badly had he been injured?  From the ravenous hunger chewing at his insides he must have had to heal a _lot_ of damage, enough to keep him unconscious for an extended period.   He forced his eyes open; it was like the lids were made out of lead.  Stiles’s ashen face swam into view looking down on him, his whiskey colored eyes turned a darkest crimson that seemed to swallow light rather than glow with it.

“Hey there, you.”

“How long?”

“Almost two days.  When I found you, you were barely alive.  Without the sustaining enchantments in the manor you wouldn’t have made it.  Scott was even worse off.  I’m not going to wake him until…until later.”  Guilt, pain, and rage lanced along the bond like a lightning bolt  during the pause but it was…muted somehow, like it came across an unfathomable distance to reach him.  Still, Derek could interpret its meaning just fine: Stiles didn’t want to wake Scott until moonrise, for the funeral.

He couldn’t hold off any longer and reached for the Packnet, only to be met with a few whispers where there had once been a din.  Their pack was all but _gone_.  Lydia was in the greenhouse being comforted by an equally shattered Jackson, her sobs reaching his ears clearly, even there in the guest room on the third floor.  The Sheriff was at the station, his grief currently buried behind a professional iron focus that was mirrored by Melissa in the hospital across town.  Scott lay beside him, pale and shrunken.  There was _no one_ else.  It had happened _again_.

He tried to sit up.  He needed to get out of here, to shift into a form that didn’t know how to feel like this and lose himself in the depths of the preserve.  “Stay,” Stiles said softly.  That one word crashed through him like a tsunami of imposed calm, his body reacting to the gentle command on a visceral level.  Stiles shifted, picking up a large bowl and spoon from the bedside table.  “Eat this, then we can get you cleaned up.”

He accepted it with weak, shaking hands that found new strength as soon as scent of beef curled in his nostrils.   The bowl held several pounds worth of greasy ground stuff blended with diced vegetables and quinoa.  After the first spoonful he attacked the meal with a vengeance, devouring the entire thing in minutes.  “Drink,” Stiles said handing him a cup the size of a Big Gulp.  It held some kind of cool, lightly spiced tea that sent soothing relief flowing through his veins and quieting the turmoil in his mind.

“Come on.”  Stiles helped him up, careful not to disturb Scott, and took him to the master bath.  After giving him some time to use the facilities, Stiles stripped him out the blood and mud-stained remains of his clothes and got him into the shower before removing his own clothes and joining him.  Derek stood there lifelessly, keeping his mind blank while his boyfriend methodically cleaned him, removing every last trace of the Full Moon and the horrors it had brought.  So many times he had imagined Stiles being in here with him, eyes wide and wanting, their hard bodies slick with water and arousal. Now that moment was finally here and the only heat in the air came from the steaming spray of the showerhead.

A half hour later Stiles toweled him off and led him naked to their bed, pulling back the covers and easing him in.  When the younger man turned to leave Derek’s arm shot out of its own volition, his hand clamping down on Stiles’s like a lifeline.  “Stay.”  He felt the word echo up through the void in his chest, carrying the first spark of warmth he’d felt since waking.

“Okay.”  Derek knew it was his imagination, but it felt like it was an ice sculpture of Stiles that crawled into bed beside him instead of the real thing.  The wasted cold on his face as the stared lifelessly at the ceiling was too much.  Everything that he loved about the hyper, brilliant, spastic youth was gone, frozen deep beneath the surface.  He had to bring him back; he couldn’t do this alone.

“Stiles,” he pled.  Those terrifyingly dark and empty eyes looked back into his own without visible recognition.  “Please.”  Nothing.  Derek pulled him roughly against his chest, smashing their lips together in bruising kiss that was returned mechanically.  This was _worse_.  He hauled them both up to sitting, pulled back and shook him violently a few times “Stiles!  Please!” his voice broke as the rising tide of emotion began to overwhelm him. He pulled him into a crushing embrace, forcing everything he felt through the connection between, trying to force his way through frigid wall separating them.  “I love you.”

The ice shattered, sublimating into steam in a flash and Stiles was kissing him desperately, tears streaming down his face.  “Derek!  Oh my God, Derek, I love you so much.”

It felt like he’d blown an emotional fuse as the surge of relief and joy overloaded him.  Coherent thought fled.  This was all there was, all he had left, and couldn’t wait any longer to be with his love, his _mate_.

With a growl he threw him onto his back settled into place between his legs.

“Please,” Stiles begged when he hesitated.  Hearing the broken need in his lover’s voice sent Derek scrabbling for the bottle of lube in the nightstand.  When he started slicking up his fingers Stiles grabbed his wrist “Now.  It’s fine just…I need you _now_.”  Derek liberally coated his cock and lined himself up at perfect pink pucker between the pale, smooth cheeks of Stiles’s ass.  He’d been dreaming of this for months and was so hard it _hurt_.  He pressed in slowly, sinking all the way in until their hips were flush together in a single fluid stroke, kissing away his mate’s grimace of discomfort.

They lay there with their foreheads pressed together panting while Stile’s adjusted, the tight heat relaxing around Derek fractionally until he was ready.  At an encouraging roll of the younger man’s hips he began to move, making each thrust last a few seconds.

“God damn it, Derek,” Stiles snarled, “stop holding back or I’ll tie your hands over your head and fuck you until you’re begging me to ride you like a theme park attraction just so you can come.”  That sounded interesting, but maybe another time.  He began thrusting in earnest, the sharp slapping sound of their bodies colliding matching the beats of their racing hearts.

Stiles must have felt him restraining his shift because he broke off their frenzied kiss to stare at him, eyes alight with red-black fire.  The feral snarl still sounded odd coming from a human throat but the Alpha power calling to his wolf needing no translation.  He shifted into his Beta shape, picking up the pace (and tabling his curiosity about what Stiles would think of his Alpha shape).  This wasn’t going to last much longer.

Sure enough he felt his knot begin to swell inside Stiles.  He leaned back, picking the smaller man up and settling him over his lap as his thrusts became erratic.

 “ _Yes_.  Knot me, make me yours.”  He rubbed his thumbs over Derek’s nipples, sending a delicious shiver through him, compounding the pressure building low in his gut.

“Mine,” he snarled, kissing him, careful of his fangs.  “Yours.”  He licked a stripe up the curve of Stiles’s neck.

“Mine.”  He took the hint and buried his face in Derek’s neck, tangling one hand in his hair to hold him place.  He raked the nails of the other down Derek’s back as his lips were replaced with blunt human teeth, biting down.

The silvery jolt of pain, carefully given by his mate in his most vulnerable place sent him over the edge with a howl, his knot locking them in place while he filled Stiles with his release.

They couldn’t really move much, but Stiles began rolling his hips, grinding the knot over the bundle of nerves inside him, his leaking cock sliding between the hard ridges of muscles on their stomachs.  Once.  Twice.  Three times and he came shouting Derek’s name.

Gently he laid Stiles back down.  “I love you,” he said smoothing back the hair on his forehead.

“I love you too.”

Derek gave himself permission to just _be there_ for however long it took before they were untied from their lovemaking.  He smiled mischievously and leaned in to whisper in Stiles’s ear “That was one.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The service was simple, informal even.  There just hadn’t been anything anyone could say that could possibly suffice.  Once their goodbyes had been given, the rest of the pack left the two of them alone to talk.

“You need to sleep,” he told Stiles, “it’s been days and you’ve spent almost the entire time working on enchantments that would knock out a full Wizard from the strain after twenty minutes.  You’re only on your feet because you’re an Alpha, but you’re still human and your body wasn’t built for this.”

Stiles couldn’t seem to tear his eyes away from the five gleaming coffins they’d laid side by side in the greenhouse.  “Soon.  Besides, I’ll have to get used to missing sleep.  The eclipse is in a month.  We need to be ready.”

“Ready for what, exactly?  To do more things like what you did to Peter?”  Derek didn’t blame Stiles one bit for putting his uncle back in the ground where he belonged. Unlike the others Stiles had insisted they burn him, placing him back in the ruins of the old house setting it ablaze, fires enhanced with magic that consumed even his bones.

“If I have to.”  Those crimson eyes flared with a darkness that terrified Derek more than seeing Stiles with a chest wound would.

“You can’t use your power like that.  Just because you’re not using Black Magic doesn’t mean you can’t turn dark.  Deucalion was a good man once, before a monster pushed him too far.”

A phantom breeze whipped up and made the plants and flowers dance and sway as wrath poured out of Stiles.  “Thank you Friedrich, but save the cautionary tale.  Monsters have better uses than fighting.”

“No!  That is not an option.”  Nausea twisted in his gut at the very idea of what that implied.

“Peter managed it, and he was a nutbar.”

“ _Peter_ was possessing Lydia, he wasn’t really…gone.”

“There’s always a way.”

Derek decided to let it go, at least for the time being.  “Your Dad had to go back to work?”

Finally, something got a reaction that broke through the grief and bloodlust.  Unfortunately it was a profound sense of unease.  “Some stuff happened while you were out.  That night…” whatever it was that popped into Stiles’s head brought a dizzying amount of shame before he shoved it back down with a bitter laugh, “two of the teachers whose classrooms got totaled on Hitchcock Day were at the school working late.  A call came in to 911, my Dad sent a deputy to check it out but…she never came back and the teachers were gone too, cars still in the parking lot.  It wasn’t until the next day people started finding the bodies.”

“The Alpha pack?”  If there were escalating to random carnage so soon…

But Stiles shook his head.  “Garroted, head bashed in, throat slashed.  It’s called The Triple Death.  It’s an old sacrificial practice.”

“Human sacrifices?”  Derek was equal parts appalled and confused.  What could someone have to gain by such a thing?  He desperately hoped it was a _very_ poorly timed coincidence.

“But hey, in a happy twist of fate, Danny had told his parents he was staying late at school so we were able to pass off his disappearance as the work of crazed ritual murderer.”  The black bubbling cauldron of emotion that Derek could sense in him began to boil over.

“Stiles,” he said trying to place a hand on mate’s shoulder only to have it slapped away.

“Don’t, Derek, just don’t.”  The cloud of guilt hanging around him was nearly tangible.  “Do you know _why_ this is happening?  They may not have originally come here because of me but they won’t stop until they get me and they will do _whatever_ it takes.”

“I don’t understand.”

He rolled up the sleeve of the Henley he was wearing, it was one of Derek’s.  “I broke my arm when I was a kid, had to get surgery.”  He held up his arm in front of Derek’s face.

“It…looks fine?”

“It is.  Very fine.  So fine that surgical scars are fucking _gone_.”

“How?  Even werewolves can’t heal scar tissue if it predates the Bite.”

“Wizard healing, enchanter healing, whatever, it works differently.  I looked into it right after I started practicing.  The gist of it is werewolves regenerate; wizards _replace_.”  Derek could see the ghost of the old Stiles, jaws sunk into a good mystery.

“What’s the difference?” he asked genuinely fascinated.

“If you get injured your body will heal the damage until the tissue is back to one hundred percent.  But werewolves still age more or less normally because the damage builds up at the cellular level, you understand?”

“I took biology,” he said drily, not mentioning it was in his freshman year of _high school_.

Stiles rolled his eyes “Wizards are the opposite.  They don’t heal any _faster_ than normal humans but they do it _better_ , right down to the DNA.”

“Fine, I have no idea what this means.  Werewolves can’t be wizards, even if we learn to use magic what we tap into comes from…a different place, a dark place.”

“Exactly.  But _we’re_ different.  You me and Scott share one well of power.  The three of us have _both_ kinds of healing.”

This was bad.  If Stiles theory was right then…  “We’re not aging.”

Stiles shook his head.  “If Deucalion has me in his pack it means they all get to be about as close as a mortal animal can get to eternal youth.   Worse, I can connect to other Alphas the same way I did to you and Scott.  If they got rid of the two of you they could use me as a channel to consume the power of entire _packs_ without having to bother with the whole recruitment spiel.”

“That’s…”  Isane.  Diabolical.  Evil.  Horrifying.  Inevitable?  “The end of our kind, at least as we know it.”

“Yeah, that’s me Stiles Stilinski, bringer of the Alphocalypse.”  Well at least he’d come up with a catchy name.  Derek chose to take that as a sign possible eventual recovery.

“So what’s our first move?”

“First we go to the kitchen and stop Scott before he starts eating the granite countertops.  I swear that guy’s appetite is scary even without being post healing-coma.”

Derek’s lips quirked up in something dangerously close to a smile.  “And then?”

“Then we go talk to the one person who I suspect knows everything and has a hell of lot to answer for keeping it from us.”

“Who?” he asked shocked.

Stile smiled viciously in reply “When was the last time you had your shots, Wolfman?”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Stiles had always been intuitive, it was a big part of what made his ADD such a nightmare. His brain was always off at chasing the lines that connect things at hundred miles an hour in a dozen different directions at once.  By the end of a good Wiki binge the inside of his head resembled a demented macramé workshop from the house of a crazy cat lady.

Since he had discovered the magic things had changed, or at least the way he perceived them.  Before he was in constant motion, never quite able to grab hold of the insubstantial threads that bound the world together.  Now he knew it was just a matter of knowing where to stand and _allowing_ the patterns to unfold according to his design.

He’d also learned not to question it when the answers to his questions magically popped into his head.  Because it was entirely possible that’s exactly what was happening.

Which brought him to Morell.  Creepily intense, Churchill-quoting Morell who knew how to make greater circles using ancient Gallic designs.  Just like those used by the ancient Druids who were fond of making human sacrifices to their gods.  Triple sacrifices by The Triple Death for the glory of The Triple Goddess.  Those pagans found numbers they _really_ liked and just ran with them.

Simply walking into her office during school and working her over until she caved wasn’t an option for myriad reasons.  Most importantly was that she was obviously not an entirely willing participant, which meant she was more afraid of Deucalion than she was of Stiles, or for that matter accessory to murder charges.  Fortunately there was someone else who seemed to know everything, and loved pulling their strings.  Someone who kept stockpiles of Mountain Ash, AKA Rowan, sacred tree of the Druids.

 

All it took was a phone call from a distraught Scott to get Deaton to come to the clinic after hours.  The place reeked of death from the recent mass suicide of the animals, just one of series of incidents of bizarre animal behavior that were making more sense all the time.  They waited in the shadows across the street until the vet had opened up the place and settled in to wait for them.

“We’re not going to hurt him, right?” Scott asked.

“No more than necessary.”  Scott’s tone said he was only half asking so Stiles responded with a half answer.

“He stood by and watched while my pack was slaughtered by threats he knew of and did nothing about, _twice_.  He’s lucky I don’t fillet him and feed him to his patients,” Derek snarled.

Scott looked like he wanted to protest but he knew Derek was at least partially right.

Stiles fiddled with the sleeves of his red leather jacket and ran his fingers through his hair to make sure it was the right amount on disheveled.

“Getting ready for your close up?” Derek asked while he watched him preen.

“I’m making a dramatic entrance, it’s all about the presentation.”

Derek rolled his eyes but Stiles felt him slip into razor focus of a hunting wolf.

“Let’s get this over with,” Scott sighed.

As they crossed the street Stiles fellow Alphas fell into step flanking him, Derek on his right and Scott on his left, six feet striking the ground in unison as three hearts beat in perfect sync.  Deaton had left the back open for them so Stiles decided on the front.  He knew this place well enough to be able to flick open the locks with his magic without even breaking stride, slamming the door open and holding it there as they entered.

“Oh dear, Mountain Ash.”  He could feel that barrier was active.  It would have been easy for him as a human to simply open the gate, but the substance had been used to murder his pack.  It might be irrational but he was going to enjoy the hell out of this.

He felt around barrier, shaping the image of where the wood had been incorporated into the building.  With a deep breath he drew in every ounce of their shared power he could.  Since no pithy one liners came to mind he went another direction, raising a hand and snapping his fingers as he lashed out through his rings and cracked every damn plank in the place in a cacophony of splintering wood.

“Nice touch,” Derek whispered in his ear making him smile and blush.  How the hell was he still in the blushing phase?

Deaton appeared from the back room after Stiles’s reinterpretation of ringing the bell “Ah, Stiles, Derek, Scott, please come in,” he said without a trace of irony in his tone. 

They followed him into the exam room.  Stiles was sure he must have some kind of masking enchantment or spell going to cloud their perceptions.  Otherwise it would take one hell of a stone cold psychopath to have normal vitals while alone in a room with three angry Alphas.  He did put the metal table between him and them at least.

“We have some questions,” Stiles began.

“I’m more than happy to help.  By the way, was it really necessary to damage my building?”

“Would have preferred we damaged your body?” Derek asked referencing the last time he came here for some after hours Q & A.

“Touché.”

“Please, Doc” Scott said in a pained voice, “nine people have died already.”

Deaton sighed, looking too world-weary for his years “Ask.  I’ll tell you what I can.”

“Are you the Druid performing human sacrifices?”

“Direct as always, Mr. Stilinski.  Or is it Viscount Stilinski now?”

His eyes narrowed “That’s an interesting deflection, especially since the only other person who’s ever called me that sold me out to the Alpha pack and conspired to the murders of _half my pack_.”

“I think you underestimate just how far your reputation has spread.  No, it’s not me, and calling this…person a Druid is highly inappropriate.  It’s like calling a Wizard a Warlock.”

“Then what are they called, pray tell?” Stiles asked oh so patiently.

“Darach, The Dark Oak.  Nature herself is reacting to their presence, manifesting the corruption of the Darach’s power in increasingly violent phenomena.”

“Increasingly?” Derek asked.  “Then he or she is just getting started.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“And you have no idea who it is?  Forgive me but I find that hard to believe.  It’s not like Druids grow on tree.”  He patted himself on the back for that little bit of wordplay.

“I have an idea who it _was_.”

“Another emissary?” Scott piped up.

Deaton nodded “And what do we emissaries do?”

“You advise the packs.”  A cascade of logic swept through Stiles’s mind “Son of a Bitch, the Alpha pack, that’s why the Darach is here.  Deucalion made them kill their emissaries too?”  Deaton nodded.  “So, while we’re busy tangling with Deucalion and his merry band they plan to whip up some black sacrificial mojo and squish us all from within the fog of war.”

“I think I saw this movie,” Derek quipped, “it’s the harmless innkeeper’s suspiciously photogenic wife.”

“Uh, I guess I missed that one.”  _Scott_.

“Unfortunately Derek makes a valid point.  The Darach will be concealing their self well.  Stiles, I believe you and your father together might be able to find a few possible suspects through conventional means.”

He nodded “Good, my Dad’s pulling his hair out on this one.  The FBI’s even sending people in.”

“What about that Paranet thing you used to keep tabs on Stiles while we were in Chicago?” Scott asked.  “Maybe someone has heard something.”

“I can put the word out, but that would almost certainly bring the Wardens here.”

“No,” he interjected, “we keep them out of this as long as possible.  Right now Beacon Hills is just a curiosity to the community at large but if the White Council takes an official interest we’ll be up to our ears in Vampires, Fomor, and magical refugees from the major cities before we can blink.  This place will be a war zone.”

“Then where do you want to start?” asked Derek.

“So far the first half of what I said during my Professor Trelawney episode has mostly come true.”  He blushed a little at Deaton’s knowing eyebrow.  Damn!  He’d forgotten about that part.  Aw screw it, there was no reason to be embarrassed when your boyfriend was this unreasonably hot.  “Anyway, I want to know more about these “Wolves of Winter” the prophecy mentions.  I asked a friend with a lot of contacts in the Winter Court and he said it’s a figurative expression as opposed to a group of specific fae.”

“You need to be very careful about acting on prescient information.  Prophecies have a tendency to come true in the ways you least expect.”

“That’s why I’m just prioritizing, not reacting.”

Scott looked confused at that “How do you mean?”

“Zea,” Derek supplied.  “He said he sold Stiles’s debt to a woman, someone that scared him.”

“But, I thought he was one of the Elder Fae?  Aren’t they supposed to be all ancient and mighty and stuff?”

“They are,” he replied.  “The important thing to remember is that whoever it is has kept up their end of the deal, granted they “safely delivered” Jackson by leaving bound, gagged, and unconscious on our doorstep.”

“But why would anyone care about Jackson’s travel plans?” Scott wondered.

Derek rolled his eyes “That’s not what this is about.  The Sidhe think long term.  The deal was for Stiles to _study_ under Zea.  Assuming we survive this the three of us might end up holding this territory for the better part of a millennium.  Positioning themselves as Stiles’s mentor could grant them a huge amount influence over this region without ever getting their hands dirty.  It’s a smart move.”

Stiles nearly made a joke about how Derek’s awareness of supernatural politics suggested he’d been spending too much time with Peter.

Fortunately Deaton spoke up before he could choke on his own foot “I’m fairly certain I know _exactly_ who you think you’ll be meeting.  Have you considered the possibility that your meeting with Zea was arranged from the very beginning, that whoever wanted Stiles under their influence was all too happy to have Deucalion separate him from the pack?”

Derek and Scott both growled at the thought.  Stiles suspected Deaton was right on the money.  If he was going up against the Sidhe he needed backup but he couldn’t let it be Derek and Scott.  They were just too tempting as leverage and would be extra susceptible to the magic of creatures whose natures were so similar.  If the werewolves had an origin in the Nevernever as Stiles theorized, it was most likely among the Awnsidhe.  Besides, claws were much less use than steel for fighting faeries.  He just had to hope the person he had in mind was willing to help.

“I know just who we need to help us with this, but I’m going to need you to keep a level head about this, Scott.”

Derek’s growl deepened to a snarl.

“You mean..?”

“Yeah, buddy.  I think it’s time Allison and I caught up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter of setup before events start to spiral out of control while we count down to the Lunar Eclipse.
> 
> It's remotely possible that not everyone currently dead will stay that way. It is certain, however that more major characters will die permanently. I promise the deaths will be appropriately heartrending and hypothetical resurrections as little deus ex machine-y as I can manage.
> 
>  
> 
> On an unrelated note I am now 33% through NaNoWriMo and thus far right on track for my three fic goal, which means I'd already be done if I wrote just one story like a not crazy person. TWC: 52799


	5. Ruby Puts Her Red Dress On

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles and Allison head out to confront the Sidhe manipulating the events in Beacon Hills.
> 
> Meanwhile, another body is found and the Sheriff asks Scott and Derek to find the other two which leads to a surprising discovery.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I recently realized I've been skimping on the Scott time, particularly the Scott and Derek wolfbro bonding time. The second half of the chapter has some of that.

“I was surprised when you called me,” Allison said as she walked through the woods beside him.  She was in her full ninja getup with an additional layer of fine chainmail sandwiched between the layers of tough lightweight fabric.

“Honestly I waited as long as I could but my investigative skills failed me totally.  So now I have to beat the answers I need out of some Unseelie Fae.  Claws and teeth are all well and good but for some things there’s no substitute for a merciless Hunter armed with cold steel.”  Faeries couldn’t bear the touch of any alloy that contained iron, and the broadsword Stiles wore wearing strapped to his back had something _extra_ special about it to boot.  It was almost as sharp as the not entirely deserved hostility he was feeling towards her at the moment.

“I guess that’s fair.”  She was evidently content to keep this a business excursion which was fine by him.  At least until after he’d succeeded in completing his fact finding mission.  After walking through the gathering twilight for a good ten minutes she broke the tense silence a second time.  “I’m sorry.  About your pack.  I heard about the Alpha pack and the Full Moon.  That must have been rough.”

She was making an effort, so he met her halfway and didn’t set her hair on fire.  “They found ways to make us do it ourselves.  That’s why we’re here.  A Sidhe sold us out and we need to find out who and why.”

“God that’s awful!” She seemed genuinely horrified and sympathetic.  “I can see Derek doing something like that but I’m so sorry you got dragged into this too.  You were the one out of all of us I thought might actually have a chance.”  He focused on the bitterness in her voice that was so similar to his own.  It distracted him from the rage.  Oh hell yes they were going to have it out later.

He inhaled deeply, trying to catch the lingering scent of Fae mixed with his own that marked the spot where he had been meeting Zea.  “This way,” he said latching onto the hint of rowan in the air.  When the trail abruptly vanished into thin he air he knew they’d arrived.  “Okay.  These are Winter Fae, predators.   It’s  really important not to show any fear or weakness or they’ll literally eat you.  We’re here to meet s Sidhe, one of their nobles.  Don’t accept or give gifts, don’t make any deals, and try not to be interesting in any way.  If we’re dealing with who I think we are then getting her interested you could come back to haunt your entire family for generations.”

“Understood.  So why are we standing out here in the middle of the woods?”

He sighed “The place I was meeting the unicorn was a sort of in-between.  Really powerful beings from the Nevernever need a ton of juice just to cross over so sometimes you can see them in special areas that are in both worlds at once.

“Like fairy rings?”

“Exactly.”  He could see the ripples in the air from the frequent distortions of reality that took place here.  “Smear some of this around your eyes, it’ll dispel their illusions.”

“What is it?” she asked taking the small vial from his hand.

“One of Lydia’s concoctions.  Don’t worry, there’s almost no risk of immolation,” he said with a wink.  Allison eyed the thick reddish goop dubiously but put some on anyway.  The formulation was sound, but he’d asked the Banshee to make it entirely from herbs and reagents that also contained strong organic dyes.  The Huntress was going to have to invest in a good concealer for the next few weeks.  As far as sweet revenge went it was pretty mild in Stiles’s opinion.

“Now what?”

“Turn back and face the way we came and I’ll call forth the Sidhe?”

“What, like with a spell or summoning ritual or something?”

“Not exactly.”  He drew his sword and fed magic into it, making the red stones and swirling Celtic designs glow crimson while Allison knocked and arrow to her bow.  “All right I’m here you bitch!  I believe you owe me a lesson!  Open up or I’ll huff and puff and all that.”

“For you that as actually fairly diplomatic,” the Huntress remarked, not quite hiding the shiver at the power and command he’d infused his voice with.  “How do we know if it worked?”

“We turn around.”  Sure enough the circle of rowan trees had reappeared.

“Wow, that’s just unnerving.”  Her hands were shaking just a bit but Stiles could smell more anticipation than fear.

“Let’s see who shows up.”  They stalked into the clearing weapons ready but remained alone.  He was just considering which horror movie cliché to utter to best bring on the slavering monsters when a gale wind whipped around them blocking out all vision.  Worse, Stiles could see the gossamer threads of faerie magic generating the cyclone.  “Back to back!  This is it!”  The wind turned into frozen knives biting at their skin, driving cold deep into their bones but just as he reached out to shatter the spell for fear of frostbite it ended abruptly.

Stiles was pretty sure they weren’t in Kansas anymore.  The woods around them were skeletal and bare under leaden gray clouds that promised snow.  The trees, the rock, even the fallen leaves were black, fissured, and rimed with frost.  Even to his nose there wasn’t a trace of decay on the air, like that place had been trapped in the first hard frost of winter for eons without a single day of spring.  Considering they were most likely deep within the lands of the Awnsidhe that was entirely possible.

What was certain was that they were not alone.

H expanded his senses to their maximum power and range to get a better look at the creatures circling them at a distance.  Darkhounds, a whole pack of them.

“We’ve got company.”

“Ideas?”

“It’s darkhounds, fae hunting dogs.  They’re bred to chase down prey so the one thing we can’t do is run.  In close quarters they should act like any pack hunter and try to flank us, hamstring us, then go for the kill.”

“Groovy.  But do you _have any ideas_?” she asked glaring daggers at him.

He frowned as he looked around.  The forsaken forest stretched endlessly in every direction without any cover or significant geological features.  “I don’t suppose you happen to know much magic?”

She gave him a look that clearly said he was an idiot “The whole witchcraft thing?  Not big with Hunters.”

“Just a question, sheesh.  Besides you don’t need to know much for my _idea_ to work.  You see these lovely trees?”  He gestured at the rowans, the only green thing for miles and heavily laden with small red berries.

“Yeah, so?”

“These my dear are the source of Mountain Ash and they’ve given me idea.”  His lips stretched into a predatory that the Huntress mirrored as he quickly laid out his plan.

 

Allison had barely swung up into place when the attack came.  The hounds seemed to be made of wisps of dark smoke woven into the shaped of immense canines with flickering gleams of faerie fire for eyes.  As they ran forward they were almost soundless, but stealth wasuseless when they prey you thought you were hunting was actually an ambush predator lying in wait.

Stiles darted forward to the opposite side of the clearing as Allison’s bow began twanging behind him, agonized howling split the silence of the wood as her steel broadhead arrows struck at least one of the fae beasts.  He locked eyes with the hound running directly toward him, brandishing his blade in his right hand while he focused as hard as he could the pile of rowan berries cupped in his left.

At the last second he yelled “Cease fire!” before flicking the handful of berries out behind him, using magic to send them zipping unerringly towards the circles he’d hastily scratched in the dirt around the base of each tree.  The tiny red projectiles, each infused with his will, activated the barriers at a touch leaving only a gap of a few inches between them.  All except for the tree directly in front of him.

Two hounds slipped around the trunk like eels as they charged but Stiles was ready.  He slipped to one side with an upward slash that barely left a scratch, but the seemingly minor wound erupted in fire the same nuclear green that toxic waste always seemed to have in comic books.  For the fae the comparison was pretty apt.  He continued his motion, stepping back and spinning to face the second hound, sweeping the legs out from under the first with invisible force from his left hand and hurling his sword with his right.

After the Full Moon he and Lydia had had a long chat away from Derek and Scott’s ears and peskily legitimate worries about the perils of using magic to kill.  Stiles knew where the line was; he walked it every day he refused to follow the echoes that lingered in the essence of the werewolf back to the vast well of dark, seductive power that birthed them eons ago.  Besides, humans had long ago proved you don’t need Black Magic to kill when you had _ingenuity_.

He had placed an enchantment upon the sword that was a modified version of the one his rings carried to allow him to manipulate elemental energies, specifically fire.  Since he used his body’s own chemical energy to power the effect on himself, calling up an actual gout of flame would probably put him in a coma.  Manipulating fire that was already burning was a piece of cake, but to kill something like a darkhound he’d need a bonfire to draw on, which wasn’t exactly something he could carry in his jacket pocket.   So his wonderfully devious Lydia had suggested he simply reverse the effect much like he could blind and confuse opponents with the same charm that enhanced his own senses.

The etchings on the sword flared with red light when it pierced the darkhound, releasing every calorie of metabolic heat in the flesh it touched in a single searing instant, flash-roasting the beast from the inside out before it could scream.

A couple quick steps and he sealed the last circle, calling his sword back to his hand as he went.  By then the wounded hound had scrambled back onto three legs and leapt at his seemingly unprotected back, one shoulder covered with glowing green veins like luminescent blood poisoning.  Stiles didn’t need his eyes to track the assault, dancing aside and swinging the blade into the creature’s upper back.  The cold steel backed by his supernatural strength neatly sheered it in two, the pieces falling smoldering to the ground.

The whole thing had taken maybe three seconds.

His moment of badassery was cut short at the sound of annoyed feminine voice from the center of the clearing behind him, which caused him to squeal in a less than manly fashion as he flailed to face the newcomer, actually _dropping his weapon_ in the process.  Talk about fast turnaround.

“Honestly child, I appreciate swift brutality as much as the next but of all the weapons at your disposal you had to use _iron_?  It speaks to a gross deficit of _manners_.”

The Sidhe woman was…stunning, there was no other word for her.  The sight of her literally made him stop breathing for minute.  She was tall, nearly six and a half feet and beautiful in a way that _screamed_ non-human.  Violently red hair streaked with white tumbled down past her hips, almost disappearing into the flowing silk gown she wore in the same shade.  It was her eyes though that truly marked her for what she was.  They were gorgeous, amber colored, and slitted vertically like a cat.  Stiles had been warned about her.  For all that she appeared to be a lovely woman in her prime she was a being that only had a loose understanding of human existence.  Specifically those things that could profit her.  She was the eldest sorceress of the Winter Court, handmaiden to the Queen herself.  She had also been his cousin Harry’s Godmother and right now Stiles was hoping his mother and Harry’s had not had overlapping social circles.

“Greetings Lady Leanansidhe,” he said formally when enough of his wits had unscrambled, “An it please thee, I would treat with thee.”

Her answering smile revealed delicately pointed canines that gleamed in the half light of the forest.  “Much better.  Although first I must insist your mortal pet lower her bow.  Were she to shoot it would break the circle that protects her.  I should be most put out if my hounds were to tear apart two such promising young people.”

“It’s okay Allison, er…just hang out for a while, I guess?”  He could see her eyes roll through the leaves where she perched in the tree but the glint of her arrow vanished back into the quiver on her back without argument.

“Very good,” Lea purred.  “That concludes our business for the day.”

“What!?  We just got here,” Stiles protested.

“Yes.  You came for your lesson and I have given two, one of martial strategy and one of etiquette.  That is above and beyond the terms of the contract I purchased,” she said primly.

Now for the real reason he wanted Allison and only Allison with him there that night.  “And if I want to make a new bargain?” he asked with a daring smirk.  Making deals was at the core of what the Sidhe were and he had a lot more to barter than one year of waning moons worth of mandatory lessons.

The Leanansidhe’s smile turned positively lupine.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“Are you out of your fucking mind!?” Allison screamed at him once they were safely back in the mortal world.  “How could you make a deal with that _thing_!?  How could you make _that_ deal with that thing!?”  She looked like might literally explode from rage the way her face was turning crimson and the veins in her head bulged.

“It had to be done,” he replied decisively.  “If that Celtic knot thingy in your Dad’s office means what I think it does than Darach and the Alpha pack are going to tear this town apart and I don’t know if I’ll be able to figure out how to stop them before shit goes down during the eclipse.  I needed a hole card, now I have one.  End of story.”  If only.  Part of him was giddy and reeling with the magnitude of what he’d just done.  Even if he died in this fight the consequences of this decision were literally going to live on _forever_.  But on the flipside, that also meant something good had to come out of all this too.  He just had no idea how the terms of _that_ particular caveat were coming to pass.  Derek would probably have some things to say if it ever came up.  The man had a jealous streak a mile wide.

“But why _this_?  If you’re so desperate to become a monster like your _mate_ why don’t you just ask him to _bite_ you?  He certainly doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.”  She was giving off rage, grief, and bitterness like a cloud of noxious gas.

Oh he had been waiting for this.  He bound her limbs to her sides and held her jaws shut with the clench of a fist, stepping in until he was eye to eye with her.  “I’m going to talk and you’re going to listen,” he hissed.  “Your mother died.  It sucked.  You went a little nuts.  You know damn well I get it.   But attacking innocent people, werewolves, whatever?  Kidnapping, torture, _murder_?  All for _her_?”  His voice dripped disdain.  Victoria argent had been all kinds of tough and formidable, but there were a lot of bodies in the ground because of her.  “Your mother was a _coward_.  She was so _scared_ of losing you she thought murdering your boyfriend was a reasonable idea.  _That’s_ what she was doing at the rave that night, slowing suffocating Scott to death with wolfsbane gas while monologuing about how pathetic he was like a fucking comic book villain.  When Derek came to the rescue she could have run, hid, called for backup, gone to get a weapon.  Hell, he would have let her walk right out the door.  Instead she _panicked_ and jumped an Alpha she’d just given a lungful of aconite armed with nothing but a kitchen knife.  Then, she was too _afraid_ of not being in control to stand being a werewolf so she offed herself.  Coward, start to finish.” 

By the time Stiles go through his speech tears had washed the rage and bitterness out of Allison’s eyes, leaving only loss and pain.  He wished he could feel some kind of vindictive pleasure in doing this but there was only the memory echo of the very same emotions that wracked her, and he’d just torn away the righteous anger that had been her only defense against them.  He released her from his magical grip and pulled her into a tight hug.  She screamed and thrashed for a minute before breaking down into heaving sobs and returning the embrace.

“I didn’t know.  I just miss her so much.”

“I know.  I’m so sorry you’ve lost so many people you loved.  But you’re a good Hunter and good person and that’s why I asked you to do this with me.  Because I trust you to take of me if the time comes.”

“I don’t know if I can anymore.  All of this is too much.”  She looked so small and broken standing there shaking in his arms.  They were just _kids_ who one day suddenly weren’t allowed to be kids any more.

“I know you can.  You’ll do it because it’s who you are just like I made this deal because it’s who I am.”

She released him wiping the tears from her eyes “So what now?”

“Now we wait.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

As Derek watched Stiles walk off into the woods with Allison at his side he was already imagining what was going to happen when he got back.  He’d discovered that there was a big difference between sex, and _sex_.  Over the last week he and Stiles had been having a gratuitous amount of the latter.  Between their Alpha status and the bolstering magic of the manor they never really got tired, which was convenient since Stiles never seemed to run out of creativity.  The young man had taken to using sex as an outlet for frustration while his search for the Darach’s identity went nowhere.  Every conceivable suspect had passed their background checks, he’d even vetted _Jen_ going back a decade.  Truthfully he doubted things would be any different if there was no investigation.  It was like magnetism or gravity.  They had taken to staying at least ten feet apart in public to avoid unacceptable (and illegal) levels of PDA.  Deaton had even tried to corner him about it for some reason after one of Stiles’s druid info sessions.  He’d rather discuss their sex life with the _Sheriff_ than him.

As if summoned by that thought the phone rang “Derek, bring Scott.  We’ve got another one.”

“Ten minutes.”

He hung up and went looking for Scott.  Not that he really had to look exactly.  After the Full Moon all the surviving pack members had moved in for real, including Jen (she and the Sheriff had insisted on separate rooms, fooling no one).  With lockdown ongoing by silent consensus things had fallen into a routine fairly quickly, not that the young Alpha’s location at any given time was a mystery.  As a rule if he wasn’t at school, asleep, or with him and Stiles he was sitting on the love seat in the third floor landing where he could look out over the preserve while he did his schoolwork.  It seemed the more their lives devolved into supernatural insanity the more the kid the harder he threw himself into his academics.  Thanks to Stiles’s magical studies (and maybe Derek, just a tiny bit) Scott had actually pulled ahead of him in a couple of classes.

Sure enough Scott was sprawled amidst a pile of literature and lecture notes while he struggled to wrest a cogent thesis out of _The Heart of Darkness_.  Thankfully there was a bloodthirsty dark druid to grant him a reprieve.  “Scott.  The Sheriff called, there’s been another body dump.”

“What?  Where?  When?”  The hair on one side of his head was standing out in a tuft at ninety degrees like Bozo the Clown from.

“Seriously, little brother, you need a night off.”  Scott rolled his eyes at the term of endearment but silently glowed with it.  Even without though Stiles’s had retired the Packnet Derek could read him like a book and vice versa.  Sometimes the closeness of their relationship still seemed bizarre to him, but he’d more or less abandoned the pretense of keeping people at arm’s length after…everything.  Or maybe he’d just spent so much time around/in/on/under Stiles he’d contracted his mate’s compulsive candor like an STD.  One or the other.

“Ugh, I know!  But I don’t think sniffing out dead people counts.”

“At least it’s a change of scenery.”

“Yeah.  I might as well go.  It sound like Mom and Jen are up to their kitchen voodoo again.  I’m not gonna be able to work once the smell gets up here anyway.”  Scott looked pained at the thought of the deliciousness that would soon be wafting up the stairs.

“Their culinary powers are most unholy,” Derek agreed solemnly.

“Let’s go before Jackson gets home or he’ll try to chain us up in the basement.”

Scott was only mostly joking.  He and Derek hadn’t been the only ones changed by what had happened.  The former Kanima had appointed himself Pack Protector, promptly left school in London, and now would pounce any time anyone would so much as think about going somewhere alone or doing something risky.

“Maybe we should try and convince Lydia to take him back,” Derek suggested.  “He’d probably mellow out a little if he was getting laid on a regular basis.”

“It certainly seems to have worked on you,” Scott replied with a wink.  “Of course with the sounds you two make are more like you’re getting _murdered_ instead of _lucky_.”

Derek shrugged and rolled his eyes.  Growing up in a werewolf household you get used to hearing things that would make a human blush themselves into hypovolemic shock.  He cuffed Scott on the back of the head anyway, the gesture far more affectionate than angry.  “Come on pup, I want to be back before Stiles.”

“Yeah, gotta oil those chains since _Jackson_ won’t be the one using them.”

Maybe he _could_ look into some soundproofing for the master suite.

 

One of the disadvantages to living in such a large house was that Scott had a long walk to wheedle the car keys out of him before they reached the free-standing garage, and Derek made a fuss about letting Scott drive his precious Camaro the whole way.  It wasn’t because the teen was a bad driver.  With him behind the wheel he only feared for his paint job instead of his _life_ like when Stiles drove.  What he really wanted was time to figure out how to broach a particularly sensitive subject.

Once they were in the car and safely on their way, and Scott was strapped down and literally couldn’t escape the conversation he asked “So…Allison?”

He’d been expecting a Teen Angst Vesuvius but all he got in reply was an expressive sigh and “I don’t know, man.  A couple of months ago I would have been freaking out about her going to see wicked faeries in the woods at night.  Now I’m just hoping Stiles doesn’t break her into _too many_ pieces.”

“I know what you mean.”  His mate was getting a little scary.  Granted, from a werewolf perspective it was a _hot_ scary but even so, Derek had never before found the whole ruthless and domineering Alpha thing all that arousing.  Then again he had _literally_ rolled over and lifted his tail for Stiles so maybe it was an acquired taste.  The memory sent blood rushing to his groin so fast he got a little light headed.

“Dude!” Scott protested, nostrils flaring.  “I don’t know what just went through your head but I’m pretty sure it’s not what I meant _at all_.”

Whelp, he found his blush limit after all.  “Sorry.  It’s just power is kind of thing for us and he is my…my uh…”  Shit this was something he hadn’t even discussed with Stiles yet.

“Your mate?  It’s okay Derek.  You’re acting like I’m afraid I won’t want you as my stepfather.”

“In a way I kind of would be.  Let’s be realistic, all three of us are Alphas but Stiles is definitely _the_ Alpha.”

“Yeah I know what you mean.”  Scott’s brow became creased with worry.  “It’s really changing him isn’t it?”

“Yes and no.  You saw what Stiles was willing to do to fight for the ones he loves when he was just a random skinny boy with a big mouth.  Remember Peter?”  He shuddered a little; the memory of that night was never not going to be a quagmire of complex emotion.  “Now he’s got a much bigger battle to fight and a lot deadlier weapons to fight it with.”

“So what can we do?”  Being afraid for his childhood best friend like this made him look so young and normal it was heartbreaking.

He put as much iron resolve into his words as he could muster “We be his anchors, the way he’s ours.”

“Damn straight.  No pun intended,” he added sotto voce.

Derek punched his arm hard enough to dent plate steel but Scott just laughed without the car moving an inch out of the center of the lane.  “So…Allison.”

“I still love her.  I think I always will but I don’t think I was the one for her like she was for me.”

“I remember how that goes,” he muttered bitterly.  Maybe it wasn’t _so_ strange that they’d bonded so easily once they weren’t operating at cross-purposes all the time.  They were basically a two man support group for Argent exes.  They drove the rest of the way in silence.

 

Fortunately there wasn’t a lot of Beacon Hills so the silence didn’t last long enough to grow uncomfortable the drove past the flashing lights of cop cars near the high school and stopped a few blocks over so the Sheriff wouldn’t have to explain their presence.  Just explaining why a man his age would suddenly get an ear pierced had been a big enough trial.  The “dating a younger woman” solution had been accepted by the man with about much grace as his son accepted raw broccoli. 

So instead of risking the Sheriff getting fired again they crept closer until they knew they were in range of his hearing “What’s the situation?”

Surreptitious communication was much harder without the direct psychic link but Stiles had come up with a simple solution: Morse code, of all things.  The Sheriff could tap the onyx stone set in a simple band on his index finger and the citrine set in the companion ring would emit soft pulses of light in time to it.  It was so subtle you needed enhanced vision to see it eve in low light, which made it perfect for their off the books Darach hunt.

 **SAME MO.  XUSMC SGT.  TREE TIED.  BHHS PATH**.

Derek puzzled that out for a minute before translating for Scott “Okay a former marine was found killed the same way and tied to a tree on one of the running paths by the high school.”  He changed his tone to more of question “We’ll shift and try to pick up a scent we can follow.”

A single soft pulse gave them the go ahead.

After shucking their clothes and hiding them in a culvert they changed into full wolf mode.  It had been far too long since they’d done this.  Despite their grisly task running through the dark woods with his brother Alpha at his side was exhilarating and comforting all at once.  He didn’t know why Stiles was still so hesitant to join them.  Shape shifting artifacts were common enough, surely he could make one?  He made a mental note to ask when this was all over.

They got as close to the active crime scene as they could without risking an errant flashlight beam setting off the red flare of their eyes.  At first they got nothing, which wasn’t surprising given the number of people milling about.  It was by sheer luck that Scott noticed a faint trail of disturbed underbrush.  There was no scent to it though.   Absolutely none.  It might as well have screamed “supernatural monster was here”.  There were only two things Derek had ever encountered that could hide something like a scent trail from a werewolf.  Since Jackson was still presumably scale-free that left the Darach.

Running at supernatural speed it only took half an hour to find the other two bodies.  The first one had been in easy view of the trail, much to the horror of the jogger that found it.  The other two weren’t even _close_. Just plopped down somewhere so random seeming it _had_ to be deliberate.  The real kicker was that he recognized one of them.

It was the chemistry teacher, Adrian Harris.

Just as Derek was about to round up Scott and head back he caught the faintest whiff of another scent nearby.  As he followed it he remembered what it was: a particular blend of ink, paper, and Alpha.  Sure enough about thirty yards off, exactly where Harris’s lifeless eyes seemed to be staring, was a letter addressed to _him_ waiting in the crook of a tree branch.

It was from Deucalion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I'm evil. Stiles's deal with Lea and Allison's part to play in it are Hugely Important and require a dramatic reveal (that will also explain why Allison was so quick to break down and mend fences). Don't worry, if you are a Dresden fan you will be totally OMFG. If you're not it will still be cool. It happens in chapter 8 FYI.


	6. 1, 2, 3, Red Light.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lydia provides new info on the Darach in a gruesome fashion.
> 
> Derek, Scott, and Jackson decide to settle up with the Alpha Pack by any means necessary and keep Stiles out of it when they do.

Derek was still standing there staring at the letter in his hands like it was going to bite him when they heard it.  It was just at the edge of the audible range for humans, but for them the piercing, haunted wail of a Banshee was painfully loud even from miles away.  _Lydia_.  But the men here had been dead for hours, nearly a day in the case of the youngest who had clearly still been in high school.   Something was _very_ wrong back at the manor.

“Is that what I think it is?” Scott asked, shifting into human form beside him.

“Yeah.   We need to get home _now_.”

He assumed his Alpha shape, needing hands to carry Deucalion’s latest missive without getting slobber all over it.  It was slower running on two legs, especially in this shape, but the Sheriff’s men were combing the woods nearby.  The last thing they needed right now was for him to get arrested for streaking through the woods accompanied by a minor, so he opted for the modesty of his furrier hybrid form, Scott following suit.

Derek cursed the loss of the Packnet as they ran.  Stiles had flatly refused to bring it back online until he could work out how to build in failsafes that would prevent a repeat of the effects of the Full Moon.  The original had merely amplified an existing connection.  Actually _creating_ a complex working on top of it that was seamless enough not be enormously distracting would be a _masterpiece_ of magical theory.  It could be decades before the young enchanter was working at that level and it was time they might not have.  In the mean time he focused on the gut feeling that one of his pack was in distress and let it spur his strides to an even greater pace.

When they recovered their clothes he snatched the keys out of Scott’s hand and dove into the car, not bothering with his shirt or shoes.  “You text the Sheriff and let him know what’s going on.  He’ll have heard the wail but make sure he knows about where the bodies are.  He should be able to follow our trail without making anyone suspicious.”

“On it.”

The steering wheel groaned in his hands as he drove.  If something had happened to her in his own fucking den then Stiles wasn’t going to be the only one tiptoeing towards the Dark Side.  He threw a glance over his shoulder to where the letter rested o his leather jacket in the backseat.  Whatever the hell Deucalion wanted this time, _he_ was going to be the one to meet him this time.

 

The skidded to a halt in the driveway sending up a bow wave of dark gravel.  Derek may have broken part of the driver’s side door but he was beyond caution in his haste.  A niggling little voice in the back of his head whispered that this was exactly the kind of rash behavior that cost him his pack _twice_ , but he smothered it viciously.  He slammed open the huge double doors that opened into the foyer and was immediately assaulted by the scent of blood, tears, and terror.

Jackson and Lydia were on their knees on the marble floor.   The Beta was doing his best to restrain her but she was struggling like a wildcat and slick with blood.

“What the fuck took you guys so long!?” He hissed through gritted teeth.

Derek looked at what the Banshee’s hands were scrabbling toward.  On the mosaic of the County was a series of long wavy lines that she had apparently drawn in her own blood.  Given how fast the manor allowed people to heal she must have been _repeatedly_ cutting and tearing at herself with her teeth and nails, which explained why she looked like she’d gone ten rounds with a weedwhacker.   It took a second for him to see the pattern to what she was doing.

“Jackson, let her go.  Scott, go get something for her to draw with.”

“Are you fucking insase!?” Jackson yelled while Scott asked “Like what?”

“Just do it!” He snarled at the Beta, and turning his snarling face on Scott “Anything!  A Sharpie, a jar of cheese dip, whatever, just go!”

He knelt beside the girl and slashed open his own arms with his claws, letting the blood flow onto her hands as Jackson released her.  With a cry she hurled herself back into her work, muttering a constant stream of frightened nonsense.

Scott returned less than a minute later carrying a can of red paint from the garage “Is this alright?”

He snatched it out of the teen’s hands and tore the top off without answering.  “Lydia, honey, use this,” he said softly, carefully placing the can where she could reach.  The Banshee pounced on it excitedly, the whispers louder and faster now that she had more to work with.  In another couple of minutes she rose, apparently satisfied as she regarded her handiwork.  She let out a deep sigh of relief before collapsing back in her ex’s arms unconscious.

Derek and Scott stood there staring at what she’d done while Jackson carried her to her favorite overstuffed couch in the Library where she liked to read.

“What the fuck is wrong with you!?” He yelled under his breath as he got in Derek’s face, shifting as he went.

He was definitely _not_ in the mood for this, but instead of breaking both of the boy’s arms he pointed the drawing “Look.  Look at what she drew and _where_ she drew it.”  The wavy lines didn’t cover the entirety of the mosaic, just the part that represented the town and surrounding forest.

The young man looked at them with the same regard he might give a kindergartener’s coloring book “So?”

“So, was she using the Mapstone to track us when she started freaking out?”

“How did you know that?”

“Because of this,” he said pointing the area around the high school.

“Holy crap,” Scott said awed as he leaned down to get a better look.  “This right where we were when she screamed.” 

“She was tracking you, that’s what the map _does_.”  Jackson still wasn’t getting it.

“That spot right there that Scott’s pointing at?  What does it look like to you?”

“Nothing.  I don’t know a “6” maybe?”

“Now look at the rest of the map.”

Derek watched the realization dawn on his face and then vanish behind worry.  Lydia had smeared away some of the intersections where the lines met and replaced them with the numbers one through six.

“Look here, where tonight’s bodies were found.”  He gestured a cluster of points framing the school.  “They’re numbered four, five, and six.  Which had been dead the longest would you say Scott?”

“Number four, definitely.”

“If we get the crime scene reports from the Sheriff I bet one through three are a perfect match for the first set of victims.”  Derek could see why Stiles got so into this kind of thing.  Investigation was fun if more than a little macabre.

Jackson may not have had anywhere near his ex-girlfriends brains but he too was a lot more on the ball than his reputation had suggested “Look there.”

“What?”  Derek and Scott asked looking at a particularly large and blurry smear over the high school.

“It’s like the other spots but there’s no number.”

“Weren’t the first three victims taken from the high school at the same time?” Scott asked, catching on.

“Yeah, they were.  Look there’s three more marked intersections.  One down by Main.”

“Wasn’t one of the guys homeless?  People panhandle down by the park there.”  The young Alpha was starting to really get into this too.

“Exactly.  This spot here is in a residential area, probably someone’s house, and this one…is that Deaton’s clinic?”

Scott looked horrified for a split second before his face crumpled in chagrin “That’s why the young guy looked so familiar.  I mean I’ve seen him around school but it was really bothering me!”

“Care to share with the class,” Jackson drawled.

Scott ignored him, enthusiasm undimmed “He came in the other day with his dog but ran off and left the poor thing in the alley!”

“And you didn’t hear him get taken?  No cry for help, no sounds of a struggle, nothing?” Derek asked.  Stiles had theorized that the Darach was using powerful veils to conceal their movements, but taking a strong, healthy young man with a dog watching him and a werewolf a couple of yards away and _still_ going completely undetected took some serious major-league magic.

“And guys, get this: Deaton treated the dog for mistletoe poisoning.  Isn’t that like a big sacred plant for the Druids?”

“Definitely.  Whatever this thing is that Lydia drew it must be extremely important to the Darach if their willing risk doing their sacrifices according to a pattern like this,” Derek mused.

“But what is it?” Jackson wondered aloud.

“We’ll have to hope Lydia can tell us when she wakes up.”

This could be the key to stopping whatever the Darach had planned.  Derek was sorely tempted by the part of him that said to let the Dark Druid finish its work and rampage right over the Alpha Pack while he and what was left of his pack put their feet up and sipped champagne.  Stupid Stiles and Scott, making him actually care so damn much.  Boy did he miss the days when he could let himself take the easy way out.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Everyone was lying to Stiles and it was pissing him off.  To be fair, they weren’t saying anything _untrue_ , but there was no mistaking the fact that there was something huge that wasn’t being said.  He decided to play along for now, and decide how big an ass kicking this deserved after he found out _what_ they were concealing from him.

“Is there any chance the Mapstone has been tampered with?” Derek asked him.

“I doubt it.  Making it explode would be pretty easy, but setting it up to tweak a Banshee’s spidersense?  It would be a lot easier to force your way through the protections and shove a bunch of LSD in Lydia’s face if you just wanted her to have a bad trip.  Besides, what would the motive be for handing us a clue to the Darach’s movements?”

“Leveling the playing maybe?  The Leanansidhe seems to like playing both sides of the fence.”

“No.  I asked her to back off as posthumous favor to Aunt Maggie.”  He’d asked her for a whole hell of a lot more than that, but he’d been careful to keep Lea’s hands off agreement separate.  It was too hard to lie convincingly to werewolves; omissions were the way to go.  His hypocrisy on that score was probably the deciding factor in not dragging Scott down to the Full Moon Room, chaining him to the wall, and tickling him until he spilled his guts.

“Aunt Maggie?”

“Harry’s mother.  She died a long time before I was born but I’m not sure the Sidhe really get that mortal life-death-time thing.  Anyway she agreed to stay out of this both in person and in proxy in her name so I’m not complaining.”  Nope.  No way to without coming clean, which he couldn’t do while Derek was wearing his favorite shirt.  Stiles had given it to him and it would be a shame for it to immolate when the older man spontaneously combusted from fury.

“Have you ever seen anything like this,” his boyfriend asked waving a hand at Lydia’s sanguine little art project.

“I’m not sure.”  Actually it was bugging the hell out of him.  There was something so familiar about it.  Something about the leylines.  He sighed “I’ll send a picture my friend in Chicago, he’ll know.”  A quick photo, a few words of text, and his query was off to one of the most knowledgeable entities on this plane of existence.

“Who is this friend you keep talking to?  I know you met him Chicago but none of the rest of us did.”

Derek kept on harping about this, probably assuming that his “friend” was sketchy and/or dangerous.  Stiles could hardly get mad because it was true.  So much so that he told no one in the pack about Bob because he didn’t want anyone to be motivated to torture the information out of them.

His text alert went off less than a minute later “Ha!  I knew it looked familiar.”

“Find something?” Scott asked as he and Jackson walked into the foyer.

“Yeah.  Where’s Allison?”  In the unlikely event that everything worked out and they all lived through this he was planning on asking the Huntress to join the pack formally.

“She stayed with Lydia.  I think they’re having a sleepover?”  His tone was clearly asking permission so Stiles nodded casually.  No need yet to explain why he of all people wanted her here.  “So what did you find?”

Fate conspired against him in that moment.  Scott and Jackson had crowded in to peek at the screen of his phone when another text came in from Bob.

“Say, how did your Lady Wolf like that trick I showed you?  I told you it would make her howl.” Jackson read aloud over his shoulder.  Stiles resolved to put some serious effort into developing a charm to prevent blushing as his cheeks flamed scarlet.

“Lady.  Wolf.” Derek asked with an inflection that was all statement and no question.  It clearly stated he was pissed.

“Ha ha, these silly misunderstandings.”  Crap, the werewolf was so not buying it.  “I may have failed to mention the werewolf I’m dating was a dude.  I needed help with something and I didn’t want to discourage the lechy little horndog.”

Jackson cleared his throat loudly “And what, pray tell, did you need “help” with that was supposed to make Derek _howl_?”

“Go screw yourself,” he mumbled.  If any more blood rushed to his cheeks there would be a risk of hemorrhage.

“No thanks.  But from the look on lover boy’s face that’s what you’ll be doing tonight.  In your own bed, alone.”

“Go,” Derek growled.  Jackson complied, laughing as he all but skipped up the stairs.

“Listen, Der.  I’m working on a surprise for you, for us.  A very _special_ surprise.  I promise a little embarrassment now seem totally worth it later.”

“And if I want satisfaction now.”  _That_ growl was suffused with an entirely different kind of heat.  Just hearing it made Stiles a little hard.  He wanted nothing more than to rip their clothes off and work out the leftover nervous tension from his fight in Faerie but he had a master plan to concoct and one _serious_ enchantment to craft.

“I’d say fuck yeah.  And fuck me.  And fuck you.”  He punctuated each with a kiss on Derek’s lips.  “Unfortunately I have to work, rain check?”

His boyfriend looked a little put out but his Alpha looked pleased and supported his dedication to the pack.  “Fine but you’ll owe me.  Something from the red notebook this time.”

“Deal.”  It had been his idea to color code their more involved or unusual sex ideas.  It wasn’t so much for Stiles, who was pretty much open to everything equally, but for Derek who still had a lot of discomfort about certain things when it came to physical intimacy.  The notebooks helped prevent unpleasant associations from derailing things in medias res.  He looked over at Scott who was probably wishing there was some way, any way, not to hear these conversations.

“Um, Stiles?”

“S’up, buddy?”  He took two big steps away from Derek before things inevitably segued into NC-17 territory right there in the foyer.

“The text?  I mean the _other_ text?”

“Oh, right.  Lydia drew a map of the telluric currents.  They’re like leylines but smaller.  My friend thinks it means that the Darach isn’t just sacrificing people for religious ritual or a big spell but for actual _power_.”

“How many people are we talking here?” Derek asked.

“If the intel Allison got snooping around in her Dad’s stuff is right?  Fifteen.”

“Fifteen!?” Scott and Derek barked in unison.

“Philosophers, Warriors, Healers, Virgins, and Guardians, three of each.”  He left out the part about the evil tree stump of destiny, at least until he could successfully locate the damn thing, but it was as thoroughly shielded as Darach was.  “You two go chase rabbits or whatever it is you do when I’m not around and I’ll go try and figure out how to stop that from happening.”  He couldn’t let the fact he didn’t have a prayer of success stop him.  If he did that he might as well just pack it in and move to Kentucky or something.  In all likelihood he was going to have to accept nine more pieces of collateral damage.  Truthfully, if it got him his pack back he didn’t know if he’d be able to resist just letting it happen.  If the pattern held they had just under a week.  One week to decide just what kind of sacrifices he was willing to make.  With what he’d already given up that night inaction didn’t seem like much of a price.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“Stiles workshop is soundproofed but he won’t be down there forever,” Derek admonished.  Their little conspiracy would never make it off the ground if they were caught before they even began to plot.

“And we’re discussing this in secret because?” Jackson asked.

Scott replied “Because we don’t want any of the humans involved in this.  Stiles is too valuable and the others are too…breakable.”

“And what, the three of us are somewhere in between?”

“Exactly,” Derek snapped.  “Deucalion’s letter said he wanted to meet me and Scott.”  His exact wording had been “see what you’re made of” but general idea was the same.

“But I thought Stiles was the one he wanted.”  The ass actually sounded jealous.

“He seems to think Stiles is too green.  It’s possible that if Stiles joins the Alpha pack they’ll be powerful enough that we could break our bond with him and still be Alpha in our own right.”

“But we’re not going to do that.  Right?”  Scott didn’t look quite as sure as he wanted to be.

“No way in hell,” Jackson snarled, “Those fuckers killed Danny and I don’t want to die either, just a Beta over here,” he said bitterly.

“Cheer up,” Derek said,” there’s five Alphas to choose from and three of us.  The letter said he’d be alone but we have to assume a double cross.”

“I don’t like it,” his fellow Alpha said, “If we kill them we take their power.  What if it changes us the way it did them.”

“Change can be good.”  The Beta’s blue eyes were glowing, probably from imagining some creative violence.  He had a particular antipathy for the twins and Derek was happy to let him do the honors if the time came to put the Tweedles down.

“I don’t care about all the power, just the power to survive.  We’ll still have the Darach to deal with and whatever comes after that.”

“I know.  But I still don’t like it.”

“Good.  You can help keep the rest of us grounded.”

Jackson made a rude noise “Sorry to interrupt, but back to part about us somehow killing the whole Alpha Pack ourselves?”

“We’re going to cheat.” He answered simply.

“Cheat?”

“He means guns,” Scott explained.

“Oh.  Finally someone around here grows a brain.”

That reminded him “Speaking of, we’ll need Lydia for this.”

Scott’s concerned look got an encore “What for.  I don’t think a slaughter is the best place for a Banshee.”

“We need her potions.  Nothing major, just something to mask the scent of wolfsbane and something else we can use as an exit strategy if things go south.”

“You think it will?” Jackson asked, clearly not totally sold on the plan thus far.

“I’ve learned to hedge my bets,” he replied drily.

The Beta’s frown morphed into a leer “Sure you want to kill Kali then?  What did the letter say, she was making Ennis jealous with how she going on about your Alpha shape.  Maybe after Stilinski goes off to college you two can shack up and have some puppies.”

If he hadn’t seen Scott hadn’t put a warning hand on Jackson’s shoulder he might have torn the smartass apart right then and there.  He did let his eyes glow red “Over.  The.  Line” he snarled through his fangs with his Alpha voice.  Jackson flinched and ropped his eyes, mumbling an apology.

“What about the Sheriff?” Scott asked changing the subject, “Is he in?”

Derek nodded, grateful “He set us up at a gun range a friend of his runs in the next town over.  The guy’ll give us a group lesson tomorrow and let us practice there this week no questions asked.”

“And Stiles is going to miss this how?” Jackson asked.

It was a valid point but he growled at the sarcasm “Stiles missed a week of lessons with the Leanansidhe and has to do doubles until the New Moon.  He’s not going to be in any shape to notice much of anything.”

The boy shuddered “Yeah, I could live without seeing her again let me tell you.”

“Is she really that bad?” Scott asked.

“You know all the witches and evil enchantresses in the fairy tales?  Think of what the Brothers Grimm wrote as the PG-13 version of her memoirs.”  If anything he was probably underselling just how dangerous she really was.

“Would that make Stiles a Disney Princess?” Jackson wondered philosophically.

Scott chuckled “Why don’t you ask him that?  Just please get his response on video.  A good laugh is was the pack needs right now.

Too true.  Derek couldn’t help but worry that if there was laughing to be done they weren’t going to be the ones doing it.  The joke always seemed to be on them.

 

As it turned out, a werewolf’s superior reflexes and coordination did not instantly extend to the use of firearms.  After their introductory lesson it had taken Derek a whole clip just to hit the target _once_.  When the instructor had suggested he try a smaller caliber he almost shifted right there in front of God and everybody he was so frustrated.  Their crazy kamikaze scheme depended almost entirely on his ability to put a bullet in Deucalion, possibly several bullets.

The other two had mixed results.  Scott seemed to have more natural talent but his distaste for guns and violence in general hindered his progress.  Jackson picked it up faster at first but became frustrated and erratic when he couldn’t get his accuracy above middling.  In the end it became a bizarre kind of Pack Training exercise.  Derek would work on his technique for a while and then help the other two to remember their individual strengths and weaknesses like normal, just at shooting range instead of their sparring clearing.  Focusing on the memory of that place helped him score his first one hundred, putting a whole clip through the head of his target while imagining it was Kali’s grinning face.

While the conspirators continued to improve Stiles was getting more and more worn-looking.  Whatever training he was getting from the Sidhe sorceress must have been incredibly grueling to overwhelm both his Alpha resilience and magical means of rejuvenation.  He usually dragged himself home a little before midnight only to devour any form of sustenance within reach, shower, and collapse face first on the bed.  And Derek had never even gotten to use the red notebook.  In fact it was beginning to look like it might be a while before he got to have sex again.  Maybe it was Karma for torturing Stiles for months (for good reasons).  In any event it was all the more reason to go to the meeting and end this once and for all.

He just couldn’t understand at first why Deucalion wanted to meet them in an abandoned mall of all places.  Once he got there it was obvious: the place was a deathtrap, even if it didn’t look like one at first.  The open air, multiple levels, and plentiful cover might be great for a shootout, but if your opponents fought empty handed and could run faster, jump higher, and had better senses than you…

The place was also great for a dramatic entrance.  Deucalion stood halfway up a derelict escalator perfectly framed by stray beams of light sneaking through the dingy glass far overhead.  He greeted them like they were sitting down to share a friendly meal at a favorite restaurant instead of squaring off for what would probably be a fight o the death “Ah Derek Hale and Scott McCall, it’s nice to finally meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too jackass,” Jackson muttered, miffed at having been ignored altogether.

“Hello, Duke,” Derek said in his most scathing tone.  “I’m sorry but there won’t be any more clandestine meetings in shadowy buildings.  No more letters.  No more games.  I’m ending this tonight with your head.”

“A bold move.  And you intend to achieve this alone?”  He hadn’t expected the man to shake in his expensive shoes, but he was expecting anger at least.  Instead the Alpha of Alphas was growing more amused by the second.

“As you can _see_ I didn’t come alone.”  Petty, yes but this was no time to hold back.

“And what makes you think I did?  Really, Derek, how do you think a blind man gets into a place like this?”

The rest of his pack showed themselves.  Kali slid down a pillar like a clawed spider monkey with a spandex obsession.  The twins loomed over a ledge one level up, while Ennis took a less theatrical approach and simply walked up the steps from the floor below.  They were surrounded, out positioned, and completely overmatched.  Perfect, everything was going according to plan.

He drew his gun from the waistband of his jeans.  The instructor had suggested a smaller caliber but having to suffer through the extra practice had been worth it.  The Desert Eagle roared in his hand, the sound of it a rolling peal of thunder in the cavernous space.  He’d chosen the twins as his first targets; they were furthest away and lest likely to pose a significant threat when wounded.  He emptied the clip in the space of a couple seconds, hitting them both at least once.  They dropped in place as far as he could tell, hidden now by their higher elevation.

Jackson and Scott opened up on Ennis and Kali to keep them busy while he rammed in a fresh clip and trained the barrel of his gun on Deucalion.  He took a deep breath and lined up the shot.  The man wasn’t even trying to get away, just smiling that same amused smile like he was watching children at play. 

When Derek pulled the trigger he found out why.  It snapped off under the pressure of his finger.  Correction: it had _rusted_ off.  The shiny barrel of the gun was turned into solid piece of rust before his eyes like it was being covered by mutant fast-growing orange mold.  From the silence he was betting Jackson and Scott’s weapons had met similar ends.

“Forgive me Derek, I should have clarified.  _We_ did not come here alone.  May I present Lord Igaon of the Fomor.”  The…man that stepped out from under a veil on Deucalion’s right looked like an enormously fat man who had been drowned, left in the water for a few days, then reanimated and given some new aquatic themed parts to replace ones eaten by fish.  His clothing seemed to be made entirely of seaweed and shells, save for a swashbuckler’s belt that had several bulging satchels clipped to it.  The Fomor Lord’s appearance may have been arresting but what mattered was that Derek could feel strength of his magic from almost twenty yards away.

“Uh, Derek?” Scott squeaked.

“Close in, back to back.”  He and Jackson complied while Derek kept his eyes locked on the dual threat waiting on the escalator.

“The Fomor, you see, are very interested in this territory.  The confluence of leylines makes it an ideal waystation and forward command base for their push inland.”

“You made a deal?  With _them_?”

“Why not?  I have no interest in your territory, just you.  One way or another this will end on the Full Moon and they will take Beacon Hills for their own.”

“Not…“  Derek would like to think he’d been about to same something cool and pithy.   He was spared from the probably cliché by a series of flashbolts exploding all around them.  Allison had decided to crash the party and was trying to open up an opportunity for them to scram.  Or so he thought at first.  The disorienting effect of the bright flashes turned the barely-there sensory distortion that surrounded Stiles into invisibility.  Once he’d gotten into position behind Ennis he dropped the concealment just in time to make sure Kali had a good view as he swung his rowan sword, decapitating the giant Alpha in a flash of crimson that left behind a hideous stench of scorched meat.

“I’ll see you at moonrise on the Full Moon, bitch,” Stiles sneered at her in the stunned silence,  “Potions now!” he yelled pulling one of his own out of his pocket and slugging it back while Kali screamed.

Derek drank his, looking to make sure the others, including Allison, did the same.  It felt like he’d swallowed a black hole.  For a split second of agonizing pain his whole body seemed to implode inward into an infinitesimally small point before the world righted with an audible pop.  The five of them were standing outside where Stiles had parked his jeep next to the Camaro.

“Are you _insane_!?” the young man screamed, “You could have been killed.  You could have been _worse_ than killed.  If I hadn’t gone over the security feed from the foyer to get a better look at Lydia’s trance you _would have been_!”

Crap, the security system Derek had installed during his paranoiafest had cameras covering most of the public areas of the house.  He supposed it had ended up saving their lives, just indirectly.  Unfortunately it would do diddly to save them from Stiles who was currently shaking with fury and practically glowing with the power he’d gained by killing Ennis.

Derek had been right before: he wasn’t going to have sex again _any_ time soon.


	7. Black Roses Red

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles struggles with killing Ennis and decides to bring in backup tat makes the others worry. While he is off establishing diplomatic relations the Sheriff drops a bomb on the pack. The Darach makes its move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NaNoWriMo is over finally. I only finished one whole fic in time, about 130,000 total between the three. Oh well. At least I can finish Hybrid Learning at a more relaxed pace.
> 
> Warning: Major Character Death in this chapter.

Coldly calculated, premeditated _murder_ , Stiles’s first, and it had felt _good_.  Strictly speaking Ennis had been an enemy combatant, there was no arguing that their packs were quite literally at war, but it wasn’t the _same_.  He hadn’t killed him on a field of battle, he’d crept up behind him and lobbed off his head like some perverse game of tag.  It was necessary.  It had to be done.  But Stiles was _so_ not okay with any of it.  What he wanted more than anything in the world right now was to throw his arms around Derek and sob, but he couldn’t.  The plan he was putting together was going to require Stiles to put some distance between the two of them.  It was the only way to make sure his boyfriend would let him face Kali alone.  Like any calm, rational person on the edge of a nervous breakdown he started calmly, rationally screaming his head off at the last person on earth he ever wanted to hurt.

“What the fuck is wrong with you!?”  He was livid, powerful, barely holding back tears of self-pity.

“We had a shot and we took it,” Derek replied defensively.  The man’s jaw was set in a familiar stubborn line that once upon a time would have made Stiles want to punch it.  Now he desperately wanted to kiss the tension away.  He let his frustration that he couldn’t stoke the fires heating the head of steam he had going.

“Oh yeah, a shot, with _guns_.  What were you thinking, going all _Hunter_ on the _Alpha Pack!?_   The Fomor are about to launch a major incursion whether or not we defeat Deucalion and the Darach.  We could have made an appeal under the Accords, but no, with one bullet you managed to alienate the entire collective of Shifter Alphas.  No way are they going to back us if we try and lodge a challenge now.”

Derek clearly hadn’t thought of that “I’m sorry, I…I didn’t realize.  There was no way we could have known that the Alpha Pack would make a bargain with the Fomor.  If that sorcerer hadn’t been there the plan would have worked.”

“Jeez Stilinski, ease up off the guy,” Jackson drawled.  The ass was clearly amused by his anger.

“Sorry, private conversation, Alphas only.”  He slammed energy into his rings.  With Ennis’s power added to their own Stiles’s strength in his weak _human_ body was now greater than a typical Beta werewolf.  It only took a jerk of his chin to send Jackson hurtling through the air out of the foyer and the _manor_ to land on the driveway in an explosion of gravel, the double doors opening and closing on their own as he flew through them.

His fellow Alphas looked surprised and an eensy bit scared.  “Stiles, come on buddy.  I know you’re upset but you need to calm down,” Scott said placing a hand on his shoulder.

“We’re here, okay?  Nobody was hurt.  We’re all fine,” Derek said doing the same.

The two of them were trying to Alpha him, covering him in the soothing comfort they could use to calm an agitated pack member.  It didn’t make Stiles feel warm and fuzzy and protected.  It made him feel _pissed_.

He pulled hard on the bond that connected the three of them and yanked all the Alpha power he could into himself, so much that Derek and Scotts’ eyes flickered blue and amber for a second before red reasserted itself.  “ _Don’t_ , do that again,” he said sternly.  The two of them held their own against the force of command in his voice, but a Beta, hell a normal Alpha would have been a cowering mess on the floor.  He could see his reflection in their wide, startled eyes and it was a little disturbing: eyes solid red throughout and beaming like a cluster of LEDs while his hair stirred fitfully in a nonexistent wind. 

“Stiles…” Derek said cautiously, reaching up to cup his face gently.  “Please.”

Oh _hell_.  Of all the things on earth that could be his Kryptonite why did it have to be earnest!Derek?  With a sigh he released the power to level out between the three of them.  So far so good.  Now that they were on the approach instead of the defensive it was time to withdraw.  “Sorry.  It’s just…I had to _kill_ someone to get you out of there.”  They flinched at the accusation while a Cuisinart of guilt pureed his insides.

“God, Stiles, I’m so sorry.”  Scott’s devastated look nearly broke his resolve.

A hard knot of suspicion began to form in Derek’s eyes.  “But why challenge Kali like that?”

“Because I knew she’d accept, the letter made that clear.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Deucalion included that hint about their relationship just to see if we’d use it to our advantage somehow.”

“But…killing an Alpha’s Mate?  She will come for you during the Full Moon.  There won’t be any games; she’ll want to finish you before the eclipse.”

Stiles said nothing.

“You have a plan, don’t you?” Scott accused.  “You have your “Let’s go look or half a body in the woods at night” face on.”

“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.  Either way it’s _my_ business.  Now, if you two don’t mind I have a phone call to make.”

 _That_ gave them pause.  “To who?” they asked in shocked unison.

“I have to bring in the White Council,” he replied as he turned to walk down the hall to the study where they kept the single landline phone.

“But I thought you said they’d turn Beacon Hills into a warzone?” Scott asked hurrying after him.

“Look around Scott, we’re already _in_ a warzone.  The wizards won’t want to get involved with the Alpha Pack, that’s our internal business.  But the Darach is using Black Magic and lots of it.  I doubt the Order of the White Oak will bat an eyelash if the Wardens take him down.  Besides, we _might_ be able to handle the Fomor’s foot soldiers and creepy crawlies by ourselves but they’ll have _at least_ one major league combat caster.  If we don’t have the same on our side they’ll turn us into pudding before we can even mount a defense.”

“But _still_ ,” Derek argued, “I don’t think-

“No, you didn’t think, and now I have no other choice.”

“ _Stiles_ ” Scott whimpered at the frost in his tone.

“Just go, both of you,” he said dismissively as he picked up the receiver and turned his back on them.  They hesitated for a moment before they left, closing the soundproofed door behind them.

Stiles waited for a few minutes while he composed himself.  That had been harder than he’d thought it would be.  When all was said and done he was going to be apologizing for this little gambit of his for at least a century.  But hey, it’s not like they didn’t have the time.  Their hugely extended lifespan was another thing he really didn’t want to deal with.  Between the restorative effects of his magic and werewolf healing it might take him several hundred years to get out of his early twenties.  He always called Derek his “boyfriend” because the reality of what lay between them, the _commitment_ that had basically been set in stone _accidentally_ was too much for the seventeen year old to wrap his head around.

Shoving his relationship panic aside for now he pulled out his cell to look up the number he needed.  Of all the ways one might get in touch with the mysterious and powerful White Council of Wizards, the number Harry had given him “just in case” was for a mom and pop Mexican restaurant in Los Angeles.  Then again, it _was_ pretty covert all things considered.

The phone rang for a good minute and a half before someone answered “Hello,” an annoyed male voice greeted him.

“Hi, I’m looking for Carlos Ramirez.”

“Speaking.”  Not much he wasn’t.  Evidently Stiles would have to resort to name dropping right off the bat.

“Harry Dresden gave me your number and told me to call you if I ever needed help, _council_ help, and he…wasn’t around anymore.”

“Madre de Dios,” Ramirez sighed, “Even from the grave that lunatic is dragging my ass into the fire.  Who are you and what is the situation?”

No sense in sugar coating things “My name is Stiles Stilinski, I live in Beacon Hills upstate, and I’ve got a Dark Druid performing human sacrifices, a rogue pack of Alpha Shifters, and major Fomor incursion coming down the pipe.”

Ramirez swore up a blue streak Stiles’s Spanish wasn’t good enough to translate but it sounded colorful.  “What do you need, other than a miracle?” he asked in English.

“One or two combat ready wizards to neutralize their sorcerers, I’ve got ground troops covered.  Also I’ll need this to be done off the books.”

“And why is that?” the Warden asked mildly.

“I’m calling in some other allies that the Council at large might object to a Warden openly associating with.”

“I see.  You know we’re stretched kinda thin right now, kid.  Why exactly would we risk our people for your town?  We can’t even hold the major coastal cities much less some place out in the boonies I’ve never even heard of.”

Stiles had no idea things had gotten so bad so quickly.  Maybe he should rethink his stance on the Paranet.  In the mean time it was time to play his hole card.  “I have something I’m willing to trade for your assistance.”

“Interesting, what?”  Translation: sorry, kid, but I’m all stocked up on bridges right now.

“My services as an enchanter.  Harry thought Captain Luccio might have a use for me.  If you want my uncle can vouch for my ability.”

“Uh huh, and he is..?”

“Ebenezar McCoy.”

Dead silence.

“Um, you still there..?  Warden Ramirez..?  Carlos?”  Stiles worried he might have broken him.  Then again that was about as heavy a name as one could drop in supernatural circles and belonged to one of the most dangerous human beings on earth.

“I can be there by morning,” he replied in slightly strangled voice.

“No need, I’m coming to you.  I’ll meet you at the Way entrance in the San Pedro Street subway station in four hours and we can plan our next move from there.”

“I take it you have somewhere in mind.”

“My sword’s gotten a little dull with all the action going on around here lately.  I think it might be time for an upgrade.”  And who says he can’t be subtle?

“You sure you understand what your signing up for here?” 

Not at all.  “Of course.”

“Well then I’ll see you soon.  By the way, you certainly live up to your reputation, Viscount Stilinski.”  Yikes.  It looked like Stiles hadn’t been the only one going for subtle during their little chat.

“I’m simply ecstatic to be held so high in your esteem,” he drawled, “Those damn faeries like to gossip _way_ too much.”

Ramirez’s belly laugh boomed through the receiver “I never said it was a _good_ reputation.”

“You’ll find out for yourself soon enough.”  He was going to like working with the Warden.

“True.  Vaya con Dios.”  He hung up.  Stiles always enjoyed the challenge of meeting someone that thought they could get the last word in over him.

Chuckling to himself he called his Dad’s office from the landline.  The study was shielded against more than just sound and radio waves couldn’t penetrate the defenses.

“What’s wrong, Stiles?” his Dad answered wearily.  The man had been working around the clock on the Darach murders but even with Lydia’s revelation about the telluric currents there was little he could do without everyone thinking he was nuts.

“I think I’m coming down with pneumonia, _cough cough_ , I may need to take a week off school, possibly go see a specialist out of town even.”

“The White Council?  Son, are you sure about this?”  Why did Stiles even bother trying to be clandestine with his Father?

“Very.  And I want you to call in the Raiths too.”

“Anyone else?  Why not summon the Fairy Queens while you’re at it?”

“I’m not summoning the Queens…”

“God damn it, Stiles.”  He could hear the Sheriff pull out the bottle and glass he kept in his desk.  After the man had poured himself a drink and tossed it back he asked “Are we really there?”

“I’m afraid so.  I have to pack now but Derek can fill you in when you get off shift.”

“I don’t like you going alone.”

“I thought we just established that the problem is how not alone we are.  I’ll be careful.”

“Tell Ebenezar I don’t care how much magic he’s packing, if I don’t get you back good as new I’m kicking his crusty ass all the way back to Stonehenge.”

“There’s an image.”

“Good luck.  I expect you to call twice a day.”

“Don’t you think that’s a bit much?”

“One is for Derek.  I suppose you’ve given some thought about how you’ll convince him to let you go alone?”

“I’m not going to tell him.”

“ _Stiles_ ,” his father huffed, shocked.

“I have to do it _this way_.”

His Father mulled it over for a minute, sorting out what was going on and why he was being vague.  “I guess I’ll have to trust you know what you’re doing.  _For now_ ,” he said finally.

“Love you, Dad.”

“Love you too, Son.”

Stiles put the phone back on the cradle and tried not to wonder why his Father had agreed so quickly.  He couldn’t help but wonder if the man was trying to engender trust in his own decision by extending it to his son first.  There was only one reason for his Dad to pull a move like that and Stiles did not have time to sort out his feelings on _that_ particular issue.  Besides, if they were all slaughtered during the eclipse or the day after, he wouldn’t need to worry things like tux rentals at all.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The Great Table and Derek’s Abomachair hadn’t been used since that dinner that seemed a lifetime ago even though in reality it had been less than a month.  Tonight when Derek came downstairs for dinner he found the throne-like monstrosity set at the one end of the smaller table they’d set up on the patio where they’d taken to eating with the doors to the solarium open to admit the fragrances of the plants and flowers within.   Someone had something formal in mind for the evening.  Allison’s presence glued to Scott’s side was a clue, and placed the split between werewolves and humans at a lopsided three to four.

“Allison,” he greeted the Huntress with a nod.  Something significant had happened between her and Stiles, so much so that she had all but moved into the manor with no warning.  What was most telling was the complete and utter lack of protest from Chris.  No threats, no visits to their door armed for bear and demanding the return of his precious daughter, nothing.  But there was no mistaking the iron set of her shoulders.  Whatever role Stiles had in mind for her in his “master plan” was going to take a hell of a lot of determination from the deadly girl.  Strangely he found her presence reassuring, feeling more secure in the knowledge that whatever scheme his mate was concocting, he had the forethought and cunning to win over the Argents to their side in case of…whatever.   Of course, none of that I any way lessened the lingering “whoops I Bit your mother and she killed herself” awkwardness.

“Derek,” she said, returning his polite nod and taking a seat on his right side between Scott and Melissa, opposite of the Sheriff, Jen, and Lydia.  He had abandoned most of the little pack rituals that they had just been getting used to…before, but the seating thing had stuck somehow.

“We haven’t done this in a while,” Jackson observed from his chair at the foot of the table.  Of all the people to sit in that spot Derek had never imagined it would ever be Jackson, but by process of elimination he was relegated to the role of advisor that in more formal times had been called “Pack Omega”.  The fact that he was also lead Beta by virtue of being the only one just made it more bizarre from a pack dynamics standpoint.

“But I think it’s important that we start again,” Melissa said, “This family’s been through too much to just let ourselves drift apart.  Besides I miss trying out my mother’s recipes for the first time in a decade.”

Several pairs of ears perked up at that.  There was such a comically extreme difference between what passed for Mexican cuisine in America and the actual traditional dishes that Derek felt offended on behalf of the McCalls when he drove past Taco Bell.  Sometimes he suspected she laced her family’s secret black mole sauce with narcotics it was so intoxicatingly delicious.

The Sheriff’s stomach rumbled audibly as he checked out the spread “So what’s on the menu tonight?”

“Lydia and I put our heads together on this one,” Jen answered proudly.

 “Coq au Vin with Pommes des Terres au Gratin, Haricots Verts Almondine, and mini Soufflés  Chocalats for desert,” Lydia supplied in what sounded like perfect French.  The Banshee was a wonder.

“And how are your other…pursuits coming along?” Stilinski asked while he served Derek the first slice of chicken without thinking about it, making his heart swell a little with how thoroughly the man had integrated into the pack.  That he was actually treating him as his Alpha despite the complexities of their relationship, especially with regard to Stiles, was more than the he’d ever hoped for.

“Well enough for now but not as fast as I’d like.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Jackson stage whispered.

“Yeah, yesterday I forgot to know before I went into the greenhouse while she was working and she made the passionflowers attack me.  It was like that scene from _Jumanji_ ,” Scott supplied with a shudder.

Derek still couldn’t figure out why he had a man-eating plant phobia of all things but he made a mental note to be extra careful as his gave the solarium a suspicious glance over his shoulder.  “If they start singing I’m special ordering a batch of Agent Orange.”

“I’ll try and contain myself,” Lydia said drily.

“At least you weren’t the one she tested her taser spell on.  My hair was standing on end for a _week_.”  It seemed she had not yet released Jackson from the vow of guinea pighood he’d made to apologize for cutting and running over the summer.

“Do you think you might one day reach wizard status?” Derek asked, curious.  Having their own representative on the White Council would be a huge help now that Stiles had entered them into a relationship, which he was still fuming about, by the way.

She made a frustrated sound in her throat that was nearly a growl “One day, possibly.  I get a boost from the manor, which helps me learn to use greater amounts of power faster, but it could be decades before I’m string enough to even _apply_ for an _apprenticeship_.” He doubted it would be a fraction that long.  From the way she was scowling down at her plate it was a wonder the green beans didn’t get up and run away.  The fundamental laws of the universe themselves would bend before Lydia Martin let herself be defeated by something as trivial as a lack of raw power.

“How do you think Stiles is doing, relatively speaking?” the Sheriff asked with a carefully casual tone.

“It’s hard to say.  His natural talent for enchanting is…beyond anything I’ve found in the historical record; I don’t even fully understand _how_ he does what he does.  In terms of raw power I outstripped him almost immediately, but even if I do become a wizard I’ll _never_ be able to able to match him there.”  She sounded slightly impressed, which in Derek’s experience was the equivalent of anyone else falling to their knees in abject wonder.

“Aren’t you worried the Wardens will try and keep him?” Melissa asked.

“Stiles has agreed to help manufacture the silver swords that they carry as well as outfit them with basic versions of some his combat enchantments,” he replied, “They won’t want to risk losing his cooperation by coming on too strong.”

“Or so we hope,” Scott muttered.  He didn’t trust the wizards any more than Derek did.  The kid had been pretty taken with Dresden.  The two of them had quickly bonded over their shared moral drive, which had made hearing about how the Council had treated Harry his entire life earn them a spot right at the top of his blacklist.

“Where exactly is he anyway?” Jackson asked, idly moving potatoes around on his plate.  The Beta’s tone was nonchalant but he could tell the boy was missing his Alpha, even if he’d rather shove forks in his eyes than admit it.

“Somewhere in Italy, we think,” the Sheriff replied shaking his head.  “There isn’t much cell reception out there, or at least that’s what that water sprite he sent us said.”  The man looked slightly pained at having to use the words “water sprite” like it was a perfectly normal piece of dinner conversation.

“I’m going to kick his ass when he gets back,” Melissa growled, “That creepy little thing materialized in the tub while I was relaxing after an eighteen hour shift.”  It had taken Scott _hours_ to stop rolling around on the floor laughing after they’d discovered that his mother’s bloodcurdling shrieks were not due to an assault by the Alpha Pack.

“I still can’t get over the image of Stiles working a forge,” Jen said.

“It does stretch the imagination a bit,” the Sheriff agreed.

Actually it was something Derek had imagined quite a bit when he was alone.  Stiles shirtless but for a leather apron, biceps bulging as he brought a hammer down in a steady, driving rhythm, beads of sweat rolling slowly down the nape of his neck while he worked.

The sounds of sniffing snapped him back to reality.  Scott, Jackson, and Lydia were giving him knowing leers while the Sheriff looked anywhere else.  He was just glad the table hid his lap from view.  When this was all over he was packing a bag of provisions and carrying his mate over his shoulder into the depths of the preserve so they could have some alone time.  Just for a week or two.

“So, what’s this about chocolate soufflé?” he asked innocently, voice husky.  Oh yeah, that blacksmith thing was going in the red notebook.

 

 

 

Once dinner was finished and the table cleared, Jen and the Sheriff produced a bottle of pino noir and poured a small glass for each of them.  They were clearly nervous about something but it was an excited nervous.  She reclaimed her seat after the drinks had been passed around but he remained standing.

It took him a couple of tries but eventually the Sheriff cleared his throat and said “At times like these when we’ve all lost so much so quickly it makes us appreciate what we do have, what we’re not willing to risk losing.  I’ve asked Jennifer to marry me and she’s accepted,” he took her hand in his, “I wanted to tell all of you first so Stiles won’t be so overwhelmed when he gets back.”

There was a moment of stunned silence, which was silly in Derek’s opinion because even a blind man could have seen this coming.  Still, though, as far as earth shaking pronouncements went this one was about an eight-point-five on the Richter scale.  The pack recovered in a second and dissolved into gushing congratulations.

“Welcome to the family!” Melissa screeched, edging around the table at a surprising speed to crush Jen in a hug.

Allison didn’t know her as well and settled for a “Congratulations Ms. Blake.”

“Way to go Mr. S,” Jackson said.

“Leave all the wedding planning to me.”  A thunderhead of focus gathered around Lydia as she pulled out a little notebook and began rattling off questions about dates and floral arrangements.  Jen looked a little overwhelmed at the sudden onslaught but gamely held her own, answering where she had strong preferences and deferring to the redhead when she didn’t.

“Congratulations,” Derek said shaking the man’s hand.

“Well at least I beat you and Stiles to it,” the Sheriff drawled, making him blush.

Only Scott was hesitant.  Derek suspected he’d secretly held onto a hope that his and Stiles’s parents might get together and make them brothers officially.  There were already bound much tighter than any marriage but childhood dreams died hard.  “I’m really happy for you,” he finally choked out.   The Sheriff nodded, doubtless knowing exactly what his honorary second son was feeling.

“The ring!  Show us the ring!” Melissa demanded.  Jen pulled it out her pocket and fumbled it on with shaking fingers.  The diamond was modest, the Sheriff was a civil servant after all and had a kid that ate as much as four normal teenage boys, but it was beautifully cut and set in a woven white gold band with a delicate vine and flower motif.  Lydia’s fingerprints were all over this one.

“I can’t wait to tell Stiles,” Jen sang, “I know this is a little hard for him but he wants his Father to be happy more than anything.  I was thinking we could all go out to eat after the memorial at the school.  He said he’d make it back in time to be there.”

The sudden reminder of the tribute she had organized for the victims of the Darach cast a slight pall over the joyful mood in the manor, but it didn’t last for long.  The Sheriff had it right, moments like this were too precious to waste, especially now.  Any sign of light at the end of the tunnel was something worth running toward.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

It had been far too long since the Alphas or the Darach had made a move and Derek was taking no chances; the memorial was just too perfect a target.  He left Lydia at the manor where she could coordinate with them remotely if they needed it, tasking Jackson with being her bodyguard.  That left him, Scott, and Allison in the audience near the exits.  The Sheriff and Chris Argent had taken up posts backstage to prevent anyone from sneaking up on them that way.  The only ones not there were Melissa and Stiles.  One of the floor nurses at the hospital was the sister of one of the victims and Melissa’s friend, so she had kindly agreed to take her shift.  Stiles had texted during his stopover in Chicago while he was changing ways but hadn’t arrived home on time.  Apparently the space-time continuum was “bendy” in the Nevernever which made travel times unreliable.  He’d almost asked Lydia to explain it earlier but decided he needed his brains where they were, not dribbling out of his ears from the cognitive onslaught of her genius.

The concert started normally enough but a few minutes into the somber piece something changed.  Something dark and mangled slithered through the air of the auditorium.  The Darach’s ability to conceal itself had brought all their efforts to locate it to a screeching halt when there hadn’t been any murders after the first six, at least as far as they knew.  But whatever working was being wrought was simply too powerful to hide.  The expressions of the performers twisted into something hungry and hard as they music warped into a cutting strain of harsh chromatics while the choir took up a staccato chant that resonated with some dark memory Derek couldn’t quite access.  As it rose in a feral crescendo a new sound reached his ears, making a terrifying counterpoint: _Lydia_.  The Banshee’s distant cry blended into the music like it was another piece in the band.

Derek jumped to his feet, seeing Scott and Allison do the same, but they were too late.  His heart stopped when wailing cut off abruptly followed by the unmistakable sub audible rumble of a massive explosion.  It was too low for the humans present to hear, but they had something else to focus on.  Just as the music peaked there was a snapping noise in the rigging over the stage, three bodies dropping into view and stopping with a jerk inches over the performers’ heads when the nooses around their necks snapped taught.

Pandemonium erupted.

Derek had long since come to appreciate the fact that humans were dangerous creatures, but seeing their ferocity unleashed as the trappings of civilization were swept away on a tidal wave of blind panic left him terrified and humbled.  He saw one ninety pound girl slam a man twice her size into a wall with bone-shattering force.  Metal shrieked and heavy plastic shattered like spun glass as the seats were torn up by the churning mob.  The heavy doors of the auditorium ripped from their hinges by the stampede that boiled through them in a screaming cacophony.

He made his way toward the stage against the flow, leaping from seatback to seatback like a mountain goat.  His stomach churned in horror at the sight of the hanging bodies.  They were students, none of whom looked more than sixteen, and all bore the marks of the triple death.

“Jen!” he cried, seeing her crumpled form under a pile of music stands.

“Derek?” she slurred as he pulled her out from under the debris, “Where…where is..?”

“Gone,” Scott said between panting breaths.  He had one of Allison’s arms slung over a shoulder.   She was bleeding copiously from a cut on her forehead.  “I can’t find Allison’s Dad either.”

“Guardians,” he snarled in realization, “The Darach’s taken them.”  He shared a look of horrified understanding with Scott, who pulled out his cell phone and frantically dialed the hospital.  They both knew the answer already though.  Melissa had never made it to her shift.

“The manor,” he whispered.  Icy dread filled the pit of his stomach.  The explosion must have been huge for the sound of the blast to reach them there.  The house was heavily reinforced against external attack, but those some reinforcements would have contained a shockwave.  If Jackson and Lydia hadn’t made it to one of the shielded areas before it happened there was no hope whatsoever that they had survived.  And where the hell was Stiles?

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

He hated having to walk through Lea’s creepy ass game preserve but the Way was so convenient he could hardly justify complaining.  As much as he appreciated the chance to try out his new blade he would have gladly skipped tangling with the faerie whatsit that had tried to make a meal out of him.  The tentacles had added just the perfect tough of bizarre to make the hulking thing all the more terrifying and he was not at all sure that the Sidhe sorceress hadn’t put it there deliberately.  She was very attentive in her efforts to train him even when she had business elsewhere.

“Lucy I’m hoooo-ooome,” he caterwauled, slamming through the front doors.  They had replaced the blood smears on the mosaic with red paint but flecks of rusty red had sunk deep into the grout.  Someone had scuffed the drawing in a few places, which really bothered him for some reason, but he was too tired to care about it right now.

“Jeez you stink,” Jackson said coming down the stairs.

“You try gutting a two ton nightmare beast and come out smelling like a basket of roses.”

“Oh please, we both know I’d manage to do it smelling great and without messing up my hair too.”

Stiles was really enjoying their snarky camaraderie these days.  Then again it was hard _not_ to improve over their past relationship.  “Here let me fix that.”  He dropped his bags and pounced on the Beta, rubbing his gore-smeared hand over that carefully styled do.

“Ass,” Jackson snarled, “You’re late, the concert’s about to start any minute.”

“Like I said, I was busy being all Knight of the Round Table.  I’ll head over there just as soon as I drop this stuff off downstairs and get a quick shower.”

“Whatever.  By the way, your Dad and Jen are taking us out to dinner after.”  There was a hint of secretive smugness that made Stiles suspicious.

“Right,” he said, eyes narrowing but Jackson just shrugged and sauntered off whistling the tune from “I know something you don’t know”.  There was no sense in obsessing, at least not until he no longer covered in miscellaneous effluvia.

He was just coming up the stairs from the basement after putting away his gear when Lydia screamed.  The Banshee was standing in foyer staring forward blankly as she wailed.  Seeing her about to use the mosaic made him realize what had bothered him about those scuff marks.  There were four of them in a rectangle, exactly where the rubber feet of a ladder would have sat if someone wanted to access the chandelier that held the Mapstone.  The device was connected directly to the confluence that rose from the lines beneath the manor and conducted an enormous amount of energy.  Everyone in the pack knew better than to mess with it, which left only one possibility: sabotage.

“Lydia!” he yelled, but it was too late.  There was a grating hum as the misaligned enchantment began bleeding massive amounts of power, charging the air and sending flickers of red static dancing between every piece of metal in sight.

He grabbed her and started pulling her towards the safety of the basement but she was too out of it to be helpful and he was exhausted.

“Stiles!  What’s going on!?” Jackson yelled arriving to help.

“Someone tampered with Mapstone!  This whole place is about to go!”

They almost made it.  He had the reinforced door open and the still screaming Lydia safely on the other side when an errant arc of lightning caught Jackson and sent him flying a few paces down the hall.

“Close it!” the Beta screamed clutching his blackened side.

“Not without you!”

“You stubborn son of a bitch!”  Jackson lurched to his feet and hobbled as fast as he could while the manor shook around them like a tuning fork.  Another surge of energy fried the electronic locking mechanisms on the door, freezing it in place.

Stiles began pulling frantically but it was barely budging “Hurry!  I need your help to close this.”

He saw the resolve harden on his friend’s face as it shifted.  For a moment those cold steel-blue eyes burned a warm amber before the werewolf gathered all his strength and leapt at the door with a roar, slamming his shoulder into it and sending Stiles backward down the stairs as it finally snapped shut with a groan as the world came apart with thunderous sound.

 

He woke to Lydia slapping his face what felt like eons later but was probably a couple minutes at most.

“Wake up!” she shrieked though her tears.

He sat up and pulled her close, cradling her in his lap while she sobbed.  He took stock of their situation with clinical dispassion.  The door they came in by was out.  Even if it hadn’t been badly damaged it had a drop-lock system that sealed it shut in the event of tampering.  They’d have to use emergency tunnel that came out into the garage, assuming it wasn’t totally blocked.  That decided, he turned his thoughts back to what had just happened.  Setting up an overload in the Mapstone had required considerable skill and an intimate knowledge of its construction, knowledge that could only have been gotten from his notes which were safeguarded behind several layers of mystical and mundane protections.  The facts began to fall into place, racing towards the terrible conclusion about the Darach’s identity.

One:  whoever had done this had unfettered access to the manor.

Two:  they had rigged it for Lydia specifically knowing that there would be supernatural killings _that night_.

Three: they had been able to conceal themselves more thoroughly than should be possible.

Four: werewolves were all but immune to mental influence without a conduit.

Five: all of the murders had taken place precisely when the pack was too busy to intervene.

Six: there was exactly one person who could have gotten his notes, dosed their food, knew all their plans, and had been _invited_ within their protections.

The ruins of their home above began to buzz as the rage built within him.

“How did this happen?” Lydia asked in a desolate voice.

“It was Jen.  _She’s_ the Darach,” he snarled.  He would have to buy two coffins.  He wasn’t burying Jackson alone.  Before the Moon passed out of the earth’s shadow he was putting that bitch in the ground.

Whatever it took.


	8. Are You Red...Y

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The pack comes up with a desperate plan to take down the Alpha Pack and Jen. Derek and Stiles have a moment that ends a little different than usual. Stiles puts the plan into the motion and makes a choice that could change everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay. So things are about to rapidly spiral into crazy town. Enjoy.

Derek shattered every traffic law ever written as he raced back to the manor in the Camaro, Scott, Allison, and Jen in tow.  The debris field began almost a mile down the driveway.  When he finally skidded to a stop in front of the house he threw himself out of the car expecting a scene that left him broken and devastated, but the sight before him wasn’t heartrending or world-ending.

It was fucking _eerie_.

The house was largely intact, save for the protruding semicircle of the foyer, which had blown outwards vomiting a jumble of splintered furniture and hunks of stone over the property like an enormous shotgun blast.  The four of them walked into the ruin slowly, too awed by what they saw to feel properly horrified.  Derek didn’t know if human eyes would have picked it up but every single inch of the place was subtly glowing with scarlet foxfire, a warm corona of residual magic energy that made him think of the radioactive sludge in the superhero origin stories in Stiles’ comic books. 

That wasn’t even the weirdest part.

Pieces of flotsam and jetsam as big as his head were idly drifting around in the air, occasionally bumping into each other with crystalline notes of sound.

“What happened here?” Scott whispered hoarsely.

Derek looked around “The Mapstone,” he said, “The structure of the house reflected the shockwave back to its origin, blowing out the rotunda.”  He had long since succumbed to the Stilinksi Family True Crime Addiction, and was a little disturbed but not at all surprised that he had absorbed some Stiles’s frighteningly broad knowledge of explosions.  The question was how a blast like that could have happened at all.  “Someone must have done this on purpose.”

“The Darach?” Allison asked. 

Derek nodded solemnly.

“But _why_?”  The Huntress hadn’t been back on their side long enough to have spent much time in the manor, but the warm sense of comfort generated by the intertwining magic of pack and Stiles had a way of sinking in fast and deep.  Her expression looked affronted at seeing the wreckage of what had been such an overwhelmingly _good_ place.

“Maybe it was afraid we would be able to track it now that we figured out those current things,” Scott offered.

Jen, who had been silent the whole ride over, was on the verge of panic “But _where are they_?  Stiles…is he…?” she asked wringing her hands.  After having the Sheriff snatched right in front of her mid serial-kill the thought of losing his son too was pushing her to the breaking point.  Derek felt a surge of empathy for the woman.  She had been so open and accepting of their bizarre lives it was like some dark cosmic joke that so much would go so wrong for her just when she was about to become permanently integrated into their family.

“He’s alive.  I don’t think he’s hurt either.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Scott muttered with a shiver.

He had a point.  Their ability to sense one another through their power-bond was growing all the time, but right now it was hardly necessary.  His mate’s rage was palpable.  Here in Stiles’s place of power the ground all but trembled with the promise of violence and retribution.

“Then where-

Jen’s question was cut off by the blast of a shotgun taking her between the shoulder blades and hurling her into the rubble.  Derek spun to see Stiles advance from the shadowed hallway, ejecting the spent cartridge and chambering another as he came.  Jen was trying feebly to crawl away, only to jerk and go still as a second blast slammed her to ground again.

“Stiles what the fuck!?” Scott yelled.

Stiles ignored him “Give it up, Jen.  Or should I call you Julia?”

“What are you talking about?” Derek asked flabbergasted, but when he turned back to the prone woman she was _gone_.

Stiles spun to face behind him but was too slow.  Jen smiled as she grabbed the barrel of the shotgun, the metal groaning as it deformed under the pressure of her grip.  Eyes glowing a spectral blue-white she thrust the heel of her palm into Stiles’s chest, sending him flying halfway up the first flight of stairs.

“I was thinking you were going to call me Mom, but I guess that’s off the table now.”  The sweet smile that had so entranced Derek was dripping with blood and malice.

“You?” he whispered in disbelief.

“Me,” she said with a smirk.

As one he and Scott roared and threw themselves at her, shifting as they went.  Jen, Julia, The Darach, whatever, extended her hands out toward each of them and brought her palms together with a clap.  Derek was pulled of his feet as his trajectory altered, bringing him into a bone shattering collision with Scott.  With a smile and a double handed thrust she threw up the stairs to land by Stiles, who was just starting to shake off the after effects of her assault.

“Let me guess,” he said spitting out a mouthful of blood with a wet, wheezing cough, “Mistletoe in the cookies?”

“So quick.  It’s a shame Deaton didn’t take it upon himself to train you when he first realized your potential. Together you and I could have had all this over and done with months ago.  Unfortunately by the time you learned enough to be useful you were taken.”  She leered at the three of them in mock wistfulness.  “Such a shame.”

“Uh…gross much?  My Dad found your medical records and you’re like _ancient_.”

“Evil too,” Scott added helpfully.

Stiles dragged himself to his feet, palming something from his pocket “The thing about mistletoe is it’s a bit of a double edged sword.”  He threw a small glass bottle at her magically propelled to a speed even he couldn’t deflect in time.  It shattered, covering her in a fine dust and eliciting an inhuman shriek that seemed wildly out of proportion to her not-injury.  At least until the poisonous powder disrupted her glamour.  Holy Fuck.  Derek’s family had found his low tolerance for horror movies endlessly amusing when he was a child but he challenged _anyone_ to look at that mangled mockery of a human face and not have nightmares for _life_.  “You’re tough,” Stiles said as she reformed her illusion, “but not strong enough yet to beat _us_ , much less Deucalion, not without the final sacrifice.”

“I’ve already got that one covered though, haven’t I?” she panted.

Something wasn’t adding up for Derek “There have only been three groups of three so far…”

Stiles turned to look at him, his face a mask of anger and grief “Four.  It’s been bothering me ever since the Full Moon.  I can still feel Isaac and Danny with me, the way that they died, but I never have Erica, Boyd, or Cora.  It’s because you weren’t the one that killed him, she was.  Healers, right?” he asked glaring down at her.

“I’d say who killed them is largely a matter of semantics, wouldn’t you?”

Derek sure as hell didn’t.  The seams of his clothing burst as he shifted into Alpha form, claws flexing longingly as he turned his red gaze on his sister’s murderer.

But she was gone, vanished.

“Well that sucked,” Stiles slurred, swaying on his feet.

Derek’s rage evaporated just in time for him to catch the smaller man who was once again hacking up blood.  “Stiles!  Stay with me!” he cried lowering him gently to the stairs.

He got an exaggerated eye roll for his trouble “It’s just a flail chest, I’ll be fine in a second.”

“Just a…” Scott sputtered.

“The damage to the house is mostly cosmetic; the major enchantments are still running.”

Derek breathe a sigh of relief as he resumed human form “Are you sure you don’t need a hospital?  Deaton?”

He shook his head “Right now I need to get some stuff together and take care of Lydia and…and Jackson.”

“Are they..?”  Derek couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud.

“Lydia’s fine.  Jackson…he sacrificed himself to save us.  Derek, his eyes were…”

“Shhh, it’s okay,” he said pulling the sobbing young man into his chest.  Scott joined them, politely ignoring the fact that Derek was completely naked so they could comfort their fellow Alpha.”

“It’s _so_ not okay,” Stiles mumbled where his face was squashed between Derek’s pecs, “but it will be,” he said pulling back and wiping the snot off his mouth and chin.

“So you have a plan then?” Scott asked shakily.  For the first time in a long time he looked like the boy he should be, not the Alpha werewolf, just a lost kid without a Dad looking to his best friend for direction.

“Yeah, and it’s gonna be kickass!”  Stiles’s attempt at lightening the mood fell a bit short of the mark.  “Okay, yeah, it’s going to be insanely dangerous and might get us all horribly killed” he said under Derek’s disbelieving glare.  “There’s just one last thing I haven’t figured out.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“You want us to what now?” Stiles asked in a tone that clearly said he thought Deaton was out of his mind.

“Taking your parents’ places as sacrifices to the Nemeton is the only way to find its location.”

Derek was onboard with Stiles’s assessment of this plan.  Hell even Scott looked dubious and the guy could usually be counted on to fling himself headlong into danger at the drop of a hat if it meant saving someone.

“There has to be some other way,” Lydia countered, “some kind of divination or tracking spell, _something_.”

“What about satellite imagery?” Allison asked, “There can’t be more than one giant tree stump hanging around in the middle of nowhere.”

Scott looked at her with awe and pride “You have access to satellites?”

Stiles rolled his eyes and sighed “Yes, Scott, it’s called local weather radar.”

“Oh, right.”

Deaton shook his head “Secrecy is a part of its nature; it’s tied to the ebb and flow of the land itself, a dark reflection of the cycle of life and death.  There is no way to find it with magic or technology unless _it_ accepts you first.”

Stiles looked up suddenly from fiddling with the strange new Hecatolite pendant around his neck (when Derek had commented on it all he’d gotten was vague deflections about staying anchored during the Full Moon) “What if there was a way to find it by _not_ looking for it?”

Deaton looked baffled “I don’t understand…”

Stiles was getting excited now “I’m talking about seeing the whole picture at once.  If I can rule out everywhere it _isn’t_ then…”

“No!” Deaton barked “Of all the _insane_ things you’ve done since discovering your magic that is by far the most reckless idea you’ve had yet!”

“I don’t get it,” Scott said bewildered by the exchange.

“He wants to invoke the spirit of the land,” Lydia whispered reverently.

Scott continued looking nonplussed but Derek’s heart nearly froze inside his chest.  Werewolves had used rituals like that in ancient times to give them strength during crisis, but he knew it could come at a terrible price.  “Are you sure about this?”

Stiles took his hand and looked him square in the eye “Yes.  I can do it.  This is our territory, our _family’s_ territory and it will defend us like we defend it.”

“You have no concept of what consequences this could have,” Deaton begged.  The man looked like he had aged ten years in the last five minutes.

“We have less than forty-eight hours until the eclipse,” Derek said staring the man down, “Jen’s keeping their parents alive to force us to show.   If she can’t kill Deucalion during her window she _will_ kill them.  We can’t allow her to complete her ritual for sake of the entire town as much as our own.”

“Actually,” Stiles interjected, “that’s exactly what we’re going to do.”  Now _everyone_ stared at the enchanter like he’d lost his mind.  “I’ll explain, promise, but first we have to figure out where Duke’s holding his little Alpha slumber party.”

“Um…I actually already know,” Allison said sheepishly, flinching when the collective glares of disbelief fell on her this time. 

“Do.  Tell,” Derek said evenly.

“They live in the apartment directly above me and my Dad.”

Stiles burst out laughing at that “Wow, subtle aren’t they.”

“I’m guessing there’s a message you want delivered?”

“You betcha.  Let Deucalion know he’ll have some backup tomorrow night in the form of Derek and Scott.  It’s only fair since I’ll be entertaining Kali and the twins up at the manor.”

A chorus of angry shouts erupted from everyone but Derek.  Stiles wasn’t telling them everything he had planned and had no intention to do so whatever he might have said.  It was going to come down to trust, trust that his mate would come back to him and still be _Stiles_ when this was all over.  He just didn’t know if he had it in him.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Derek had thought he’d said goodbye to this kind of tense waiting that bordered on lurking, but now that his beautiful house had been reduced to a similar state to his old he was beginning to wonder if the pattern was doomed to repeat forever.  Sure the most important parts of the house, their bedrooms, workshops, kitchen, bathrooms and the like were still there, but that feeling of safety had been stripped away and replaced by the perpetual sensation of imminent apocalypse.

It was making his _teeth_ itch.

Stiles and Lydia had vanished into the dark recesses to cook up whatever magical mayhem they needed for Stiles deranged battle plan to succeed.  And it was.  Absolutely, unquestionably, bat-shit _crazy_.  The disturbing part was how little that fact disturbed him.  At this point it was almost comfortable, really.

He felt calm as he watched the sun disappeared below horizon, possibly for the last time in his life.  This was something he knew.  Soon it would be claws and fangs and blood, but that was natural for a born werewolf and part of him felt a thrill at the chance to prove himself as an Alpha should.

“Hey you,” Stiles said as he came up from behind and wrapped his arms around Derek, resting his chin on the larger man’s shoulder.

“Hey.”

“We have an hour or so before you need to get in position.  Scott already left to spend some time with Allison before…  I was wondering if thought about how you’d like to spend it?”

Boy had he, and from the looks Scott and Allison had been giving each other it was in exactly the same way too.  If this was going to be the last time he and Stiles were together he wanted to spend it with his mate in his arms, his knot tying them together like they’d never be pulled apart.  He turned his head to kiss him, sweetly at first but rapidly becoming searing.  Together they stumbled down the hall to their room, shedding clothing as they went, trying desperately to keep as much of their skin touching as possible at all times.  By the time they fell onto the bed in a tangle of limbs and heat they were both naked, hard and ready.

Stiles pulled back for a moment biting his lip nervously “Do you mind if I top?  There’s something I want to…” he trailed off blushing.

Derek kind of did mind, but he was admittedly curious about whatever Stiles had in mind.  Besides, he could never refuse him anything when he had that vulnerable look on his face.  “Okay.”

“Lie on your stomach.”

Derek stretched out hips lifted up for his lover.  His pangs of regret at missing out on a more _romantic_ last night were burned to ash as Stiles slicked up his fingers and started working him open.  The younger man loved taking his time when he did this, slowly teasing and caressing until he was snarling with need, but right now that wasn’t what they both needed.  After only a minute or so Stiles settled behind him, pressing into Derek until he bottomed out in one smooth motion.  He grabbed his hips with bruising strength and quickly built up a brutal pace, pounding into him while softly moaning his name in a constant litany like a prayer.

It didn’t take long for Stiles’ practiced thrusts and their mutual desperate need to cause the silvery heat to start pooling low in Derek’s abdomen.  Sensing it, Stiles pulled him up so his back was flush with his chest.  As Stiles’ hips snapped Derek brought his weight down, each beat striking just the right spot with delicious force.

“Wait!” Stiles gasped out as Derek wrapped a hand around himself.

He let his hands be pulled up to his chest, their fingers intertwining while the intensity grew and grew.  “Stiles!” he pled, but the other man’s pace began to falter as Derek felt a strange sensation growing inside him.  “Is that what I think it is!?”  Not that he could really think all that well right now, not with what was unmistakably Stiles’s _knot_ grinding over his prostrate and reducing him to a quivering mess.  Damn, he should really have had that talk with Deaton.  Stiles wasn’t a werewolf so it wasn’t as big a deal but _still._

“I wanted to do this for you at least once, to show you.  I love, Derek, you’re my mate and I’m yours.  Forever.”  The raw emotion in Stiles’s voice stripped away the flicker of misgiving.  He’d _said_ it; he was _claiming_ him.  Derek had spent a lot of time figuring out to prevent his own knot from forming when he wasn’t on top, but Stiles’s declaration had obliterated any vestige of self control.  The base of his shaft swelled up rock hard as he shifted into Beta form.  His mate’s strong, sword-calloused hands quickly found their way to it, squeezing and stroking.  The combination of Stiles’s knot inside him and his in Stiles’s hand had him howling out his release, his vision erupting in scarlet sparkles of light as his mate’s teeth dug into the muscle the base his neck.

They stayed like, tied together in each other’s arms, crying out as they came again and again until their swelling finally went down and they collapsed onto bed, exhausted and covered with sweat and come.

“I love you too, mate,” Derek whispered, basking in the bone deep affection shining through the glowing red of Stiles’ eyes.  “Forever.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Stiles was having trouble concentrating on the task at hand.  A large part of him wanted to blow off the impending clusterfuck, chase his mate down and mount him again until they had to stop for fear of dehydration.  He’d worried for a second when Derek froze up on him after his (not so) little surprise.  Changing form was a difficult if pretty standard enchantment, especially with werewolf DNA on hand to use as a template; he’d worked it out weeks ago.  Of course, when he explained this to Derek while they were getting dressed after, he didn’t mention that he hadn’t actually used _that_. Relaxing the effect of the Hecatolite charm was a gamble but it turned out to be more than worth the risk.  Derek was going to kick his ass when he found out where the knot had _really_ come from.

He shook his head to clear the thoughts of lust and certain drama and focused on the silver chalice in his hand.  When he’d collected the blood samples from the pack more than a month ago he intended to keep them for emergency spellwork if something happened and he needed to intervene remotely.  He certainly had never thought they would be used for _this_.

A Sanctum Invocation was some serious shit.  If he pulled this off he’d not only be able to find the Nemeton but would be able to draw on the spirit of the land for power.  Considering that once the spirit took form it would be strengthened by the leyline confluence he was looking at _major_ boost.  He would need every bit of it to face the Fomor tomorrow.  You know, assuming he actually survived the ritual, Deucalion, and The Darach first.  How was this his life?

It hadn’t taken long to pull up the shattered floor of the foyer to expose the dirt beneath and scratch a circle into the soft soil.  Now it was time for the magic.  There were many variations of this practice but for the sake of simplicity (not to mention safety) he’d decided to go with the bare bones approach, allowing the massive currents of energy beneath his feet to flow up into the circle.

As the air became charged with white light he spoke “Spirit of the land, I summon thee.  I am Magus.  I am Alpha.  I am your guardian and your architect.  I summon thee!”  He poured the mingled blood in the chalice on the ground.  “The blood of the pack, given freely in your defense!  I invoke, conjure, and command your aid.”  He drew in a deep breath, filling his voice with power as he eyes glowed brilliant red throughout and bellowed one last time “I SUMMON THEE!” and broke the circle.

A whole lot of nothing happened.

“Well that was disappointing,” he muttered.

“Don’t be too hard on yourself, child, you are fairly new to this after all.”

Stiles jumped about a foot in the air, spinning around with a less than manly shriek only to slip in the mud-blood and go down hard, the chalice that had gone flying coming down to bounce off his head with a clang.           

“Owwww,” he said looking up at his surprise guest with n accusing glare.  The woman was slightly insubstantial but so very _there_ in a way he wasn’t even sure he wanted to _try_ wrapping his around.  “You’re the spirit of the land?  You look sort of familiar.”

“Is that so?”  Dark eyes sparkled merrily in a striking face surrounded by a thick fall of curling black tresses.  She was very beautiful in a severe way and also very nude.  “You are mistaken on one point, however.  _I_ am not the spirit of the land, _we_ are.”

Stiles could see more figures, hazier than the first, but just as _there_.  The difference was these didn’t look as human with their claws and fur and _glowing red eyes_.  “You…your…Alphas.  _The_ Alphas.”

“Correct,” she said with a slight nod, “Although all the members of the Hale pack are part of us as well.”

Stiles tried not to let the implications of that get his hopes up, but _damn_.  “But if you’re all the Alphas that have ever ruled here that would make you…” he trailed off in horror and jerked his eyes skyward.

“Talia Hale.”  Her voice was even but Stiles had the distinct impression that if he were to look at _Derek’s Mom’s bare chest_ it would be shaking with barely restrained laughter.

“Wow, so this is super awkward.”  A mortifying thought occurred to him.  “You, uh, weren’t hanging around here earlier being all ghost-y by any chance?”  He brought his gaze to rest firmly on her hairline.

“Why, was there something to see?”  Apparently Peter’s wickedly inappropriate sense of humor was a family trait.  Derek and Cora must have gotten their stoicism from their Father’s side.

“Nothing important.  Soooooo, how do we go about doing the land-bonding thing.  Please tell me I just have to like…eat some dirt or something cuz I’m flashing back to an episode of _Lost Girl_ right now and I’m not sure I’ll survive bleaching my brain to remove the imagery.”   This was _his mate’s mother_ for crying out loud!  He needed to find his thought-mouth filter.

“It’s already done.  I just wanted a chance to meet my son’s mate in person.”

“This must be the weirdest iteration of the “meet the parents” trope _ever_ ,” he muttered sourly.

“You’ll be fine, but if I may give you one piece of advice?”  He nodded jerkily.  “Be honest with Derek, always.  The secrets he’s kept and that were kept from him nearly destroyed him more than once.  Pack is about family first and foremost, the love that binds us together as both humans and wolves.  It takes trust for those ties to grow and flourish.”

“I’ll uh…work on that?” he said sheepishly.

“See that you do,” she replied with a stern expression that quickly melted into fond exasperation.  Even spirits from the beyond got “Stiles Face” around him!  “Before I go there is someone else who want to talk to you.”

Stiles’s mother flickered into view looking much more solid and fully clothed, making him sigh in relief.  At least until the fact that his mother was _right there_ caught up to him and his brain seized up.  “Mom!?” he croaked.

“Failbe, my darling son, look at you all grown up.”  Stiles strongly favored his mother in appearance.  Claudia Stilinski had the same freckled skin, the same eyes, even the same warm brown hair that fell to her shoulders in silken chaos that echoed her vivacious spirit.  “Mated, with a house and a family, I’m so proud of you,” she said eyes glistening.

Stiles was too flummoxed to mount a touching Hallmark moment and break down into clichés.  “So you’re okay with the whole gay-werewolf-Alpha-hocus-pocus deal?”

“You’ve always been one of a kind my son.  Besides, if you haven’t noticed my family is not exactly normal.”

“How are you here?  Wait _are_ you really here or is this like a vision quest thing?”

“I’m here.  Talia’s always been a good friend to me and helped my bend the rules a bit.”  She smiled conspiratorially with the other woman.  He wondered if that’s what it looked like from the outside when his Dad caught him and Scott plotting their misadventures.

“I guess Harry couldn’t come too, huh?  I never got thank him for everything before…you know.”  Stiles wanted to be polite and didn’t know if the D word was a touchy subject for ghosts.  “Could you tell him for me when you..?” he asked fluttering his hands upward.

“I’m sorry but your cousin isn’t…available to take my calls.”  She gave him a familiar level gaze that told him to keep quiet and puzzle it out later.

Now he teared up “I miss you.”

She walked up to him and held a hand up by his cheek just short of touching.  “I know.  We’ll be together again someday, but right now you have people here who need your love and support more.  At least for the next thousand years or so.”  He was so much taller than her now. 

“First I need to make it through tomorrow,” he said, suddenly full of childlike fear and wanting his mother to soothe it away.”

“None of that now,” she said snapping her fingers at his nose.  “I wish I could stay longer but you have a prior engagement and I’m pushing things just by coming here.”

“But…”  There was no way to even formulate a desperate plea he missed so many things about her.

“I’m always with, Stiles, and so are the Hales.  You are tied to them now as is your pack.  The spirit of the land is the spirit of the pack and as long as you remember that you’ll never be alone.”

“I love you,” he whispered as a tear made its way down his cheek, dripping off his face and falling right through her solid-seeming hand.  He had to let her  
go.  As much as it tore him up to say goodbye this wasn’t her place anymore.

“I love you too.  Now go show that bitch what happens when you mess with a McCoy.”  She stepped back and began to fade as Talia stepped forward.

“I know what you want us to do tomorrow and we agree.  At sunrise the Hale Alphas fight beside you.”

“Thank you Mrs. Hale, Talia, Derek’s Mom…” he stammered.

She rolled her eyes, another Hale-ism “Just go.  The Leanansidhe served them up to you on a plate and I suggest you dig in before it gets cold.”

With that last bit of disturbing metaphor the figures faded.  He closed his eyes and focused his awareness.  There it was!  Like a vast spider web the power of the Nemeton wove in and around the earth like cold, black veins collected the life force of the living land so it could be devoured and reborn.  Once he’d located the center of it just a few miles away he fired off a quick text to Derek and went out onto the driveway to wait for Moonrise and Kali.

 

 

He didn’t have to wait long.

“Where’s your sword, Little Red?” she mocked as she sauntered over the gravel, creepy toe-claws making screechy sounds over the larger bits.

“Not gonna need it for you.  No sense in getting it all messy before tomorrow.  By the way, _Kali?  Deucalion?_   Seriously, what were you thinking coming up with such ridiculously douche names?”

“I’m going to enjoy this,” she snarled.

“Uh huh.  And you two,” he called over her shoulder to Aiden and Ethan, currently fused into a walking PSA for steroid abuse, “Consider investing in moisturizer.  You’ve got some skin cracking going on in your T zone.”  There gibes delivered, Alpha pissed.  Now for the tricky part.

Kali bred her fangs and rose up on the balls of her feet “Deucalion wants you alive, but I’m sure he’ll get over it.  I’ll just take your power myself as a consolation prize.”  She flung herself at his with a roar, claws outstretched and eyes alight with insane fury.

Stiles focused on the charm around his neck and withdrew its protection from his hands and forearms.  At the last instant he lunged forward, driving the huge razor-edged claws that had grown from his fingertips deep into her chest.  A few days ago the impact of her body slamming into his would have left broken and bleeding on the ground.

That was then.

Now he barely rocked back while she struggled vainly to free herself from his killing grip, but her claws could find no purchase in the fur that covered his arms.

“No…” she moaned weakly, a rush of blood coming from her mouth.  She wasn’t dead, not yet it wasn’t time, but she sure as hell wouldn’t have much in the way of fight left in her tonight.

Tweedle Mega roared with rage and lumbered forward, ungainly and far too slow.  Stiles slipped behind him as he rushed by and kicked out at the backs of their knee, bringing their head down within reach.  Without warning or hesitation he grabbed it and twisted sharply to one side, breaking their neck.  They shimmered and split apart as they fell, alive but out of commission.

The rage and power singing through him was _glorious_.  He barely managed to shove the intoxicating crimson out of his thoughts and back behind the charmed Hecatolite.  The Leanansidhe was definitely good for her word.  His phone chimed a warning in his pocket.

Now he had to wait.


	9. Wrapped in Red

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final showdown at the Nemeton commences. Who will still be standing to face the Fomor when the sun rises?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't even know what to say about the insanity in this chapter. A lot of it won't make sense if you're unfamiliar with how werewolves work in The Dresdenverse. A lot of stuff happens off screen so to speak, but that's deliberate. Some things happen that the ain characters don't really notice that are much bigger deals than they know. More about that in the sequels.

Deucalion had been ever so amused when Derek and Scott showed up like they’d agreed, taunting Scott about his mother’s predicament and how they should have joined him from the start.

Pretentious ass. 

Stiles didn’t say he absolutely couldn’t die tonight for their plan to work and Derek was not going to pass on the opportunity if it presented itself.  The blind Alpha’s power was beyond ridiculous.  Derek no longer wondered how he’d managed to get four other Alphas to submit to him when he could feel the urge himself.  Deucalion was quite simply out of his league.

But he was still a pretentious ass.

The waiting was difficult, even more difficult than not snatching those stupid sunglasses off and crushing them, but the timing had to be precise.  After Stiles finally texted them the Nemeton’s location they had to make their move just before the eclipse when they were at their most powerful and Jen was still vulnerable.  Then, working together they would take her down before she could complete the final sacrifice.  At least, that was the plan as far as Deucalion knew.

The moon was riding high in the night sky when they arrived at the prescribed time.  At least it was when he could see it.  The Darach had whipped up a massive storm for dramatic effect or something and Derek had never seen its like in his entire life.  There wasn’t any rain but the roiling black clouds shot bolts of lightning back and forth like dueling warships as they raced by in broken clumps, propelled by the screaming wind that gusted erratically from all directions at once.

Until suddenly it stopped.  A hole had opened up in the maelstrom above them like the eye of a hurricane, allowing silver moonlight to flood the clearing and dance over the bark of the ancient tree.

Jen stood before it dressed in black and grinning like a lunatic.  This was probably going to hurt when they got to the actually _fighting_ , but for now he placed a restraining hand on Scott’s arm so the two arch villains could begin the feeble banter portion of the night’s festivities.

“My, this _is_ a sacrifice.  Three Alphas, guardians of their packs, and The Demon Wolf himself.”

“And all the time you’ve spent running around gathering herbs and strangling the townsfolk is supposed to frighten me?”  Deucalion tossed his cane aside and took off his glasses, shifting into a corrupt mockery of a Beta shape that lent credence to his self-appointed title.  He looked fucking terrifying.

“Do you know what it takes to look like this?”

“A blind joke?  Really, Julia?” he scoffed.

Jen flinched at the sound of her real name but it only made the maniacal gleam in her eyes burn brighter.  “It takes _power_.”  Her crazy eyes glowed as she gathered her power, making the ground shake beneath them.

Derek could hear Melissa’s screams as parts of the cellar began to collapse.

Deucalion rushed forward as Jen did the same, unleashing a massive blast of darm magic right in his kisser.

It slid off him like water off a duck.

The Demon Wolf backhanded the Darach, sending her spinning through the air to land on the other side of the Nemeton with a grunt.  “Impossible,” she groaned out as she rose with fear in her eyes.  Derek had been practicing his countermagic but _that_ display was unreal.  They were going to have to modify their plan or this would end way too soon.

He nodded to Scott and they dashed apart, circling to attack Deucalion from both sides.  All they got for their trouble were matching sets of deep gouges over their chests and stars wheeling around their heads from being clawed, slammed into each other (why was that so popular with those two) and tossed aside like unruly puppies.

“Oh my, treachery, how entirely unpredicted,” The Demon Wolf drawled.  That accent sounded a lot more intimidating coming through fangs.

They got to their feet and attacked again, this time trying to keep him occupied instead of causing any real damage.  It was going well until Scott saw Jen trying to make a run for it and had to break off to menace her flank.  Soon Deucalion and Jen were between them, devoting as much attention to fending each other off as him and Scott.

Stiles’s personalized ring tone (the theme from _Merlin_ because Derek’s mate was an adorably unrepentant geek) sounded from both their cell phones.  That was signal things were _really_ about get hairy.

“Deucalion!  Move!” he cried as he and Scott backpedaled away from the Darach, now showing her true face to conserve power.  Still horrifying.

She froze back going ramrod straight as he eyes began to glow more brightly than ever like cold, dying stars.  The trembling of the ground intensified as she rose up a few inches into the air until with one mighty lurch and massive blast of wind the werewolves were all three thrown from their feet.  In the sudden, complete absence of sound after all the cacophony the sound of their breath whooshing out as they hit the ground seemed deafening.

Derek looked up to see the flesh on the Darach’s face begin to boil and writhe.  It was beyond nauseating at first but slowly the deformed features melted into the familiar face she’d worn as “Jen”.

“Well done Stiles,” she said, joy and shock raising the pitch of her voice to just shy of a girly squeal.  “I honestly didn’t think he had it in him.  Oh we are going to have some fun together.”  Derek growled at that.  The way she said “fun” made him think her idea of a good Stiles-Jen time was frolicking in the blood of virgins, possibly followed by some hardcore bondage.

Like.  Hell.

“You’re going to stay away from him,” he snarled.  Just to twist the knife in she rolled her eyes and gave him a perfect imitation of Stiles’s patented bitch face.

“What…I don’t..?” Deucalion stammered.

It was Scott who answered “Three Alphas were sacrificed instead of our parents.  You’re an Omega now.”  Derek had never seen such a grim and forceful expression on the kid’s face before.  No, Scott really wasn’t a kid anymore, maybe hadn’t been for a while. 

“No.  I’m still an Alpha, _the_ Alpha,” he snarled.  The bravado was somewhat spoiled when he spun around and made a break for the treeline.

Jen had other ideas.

A bolt of lightning lanced out of the clear sky above them, sending a slightly smoking Deucalion flying back towards her to land on the Nemeton itself with a sickening _crack_.  “Stick around for a while,” she said with a parody of a polite smile.  She leaned down close to whisper in the broken werewolf’s ear “I’m not done with you yet.  I want you to see the eclipse first, to lay at my feet blind and powerless before I kill you.”  As far as villainous threats went Derek gave it solid 8.

He felt a pulling sensation in his gut that stole the strength from his limbs and made him wobble where he stood.  Scott looked equally unsteady, the red of his eyes fading to yellow as Derek knew his had become blue again.

“What is this?” Jen hissed, “The eclipse hasn’t started yet!”

“No, but once it does we won’t have much use for all that power, so it’s going where it can do some good.”  Derek smirked at her.  He didn’t know what Stiles’s secret weapon was, actually he was only mostly sure Stiles _had_ one, but drawing in that much Alpha power along with the energy of the land itself was going to give it a whale of a kick whatever it was.

Four heads snapped up at the sound of bare feet approaching _fast_.

“Stiles!” Scott yipped happily.

  
“Did I miss anything?” he asked after bounding out of the woods into the clearing like a demented gazelle.  “Hey babe,” he danced over to Derek and planted a loud, wet kiss on his lips.

“Oh not much, a little fighting a little fun with electricity, all in all your average day in Beacon Hills.”

“Oh well carry on then.  By the way, _Jen_ , isn’t the whole wicked stepmother spiel a little on the nose?  I mean you moved into our enchanted house in the forest and everything while plotting your evil magicky agenda.”  The Darach just stared at him.  “Whatever, I have to get back to trying to clean Alpha Bitch out from under my fingernails anyway,” he said grinning at Deucalion. 

“It’s not too late,” the man wheezed, “together we can beat her.”

Jen laughed, high and cold “Oh but it is too late!”

The eclipse had arrived.

As the earth’s shadow stretched across the moon it was like someone was turning the dimmer switch down on Derek’s senses.  Within seconds he was all but blind and deaf in the darkness.  _This_ was what humans had to work with?  His respect for the species’ will to survive rose a couple of notches.  Hopefully he could tap into some of that, since he was now totally powerless and all of twenty feet away from a mystically supercharged serial killer.

“Actually you’re both wrong,” Stiles sing-songed, “Sorry Dukey but I’m not doing anything with you unless it’s peeing on your grave, but we can get to that later.”  He turned to face Jen, the playful demeanor vanishing behind a bulwark of icy rage “As for you, you took something from me and I want it back,” he said as his eyes did that bizarre solid scarlet thing.  It was pretty much the only illumination Derek had to see by and made the tableau before him look just that much creepier.

“So what?  It doesn’t matter how much Alpha power you’re holding; your little rings and trinkets can’t harm me.”  Seriously, she was working right down the list of Evil Overlord clichés.  Stiles threw a glance his way, their amused smirks perfect twins as they shared that thought.  The smile was short lived.

“You’re right, my gizmos and gadgets can’t hurt you, but these can,” he said holding up clawed hands and wiggling them for dramatic effect.

Four faces held identical expressions of “What the _fuck!?_ ”

“You see, there’s a reason that the packs signed on to the accords as “Shifters”.  By definition a werewolf is a human that becomes a wolf and our “werewolves” over here aren’t human, sorry Scotty.”

“It’s okay man, proper vocabulary usage is important.”  The young Alpha smiled at the fake English teacher, gloating over his successfully multilayered use of irony.

“So? You’ve learned some rudimentary transformation.”

“Again, _wrong_.  There’s a lot of different ways to become a wolf, but only one that requires wearing something like this on the Full Moon,” he said holding up his pendant.

Derek had no idea where Stiles was going with this but Jen did if the way all the blood drained from her face was any indication.  “Hecatolite?  No, you can’t be.  It’s not _possible_!”  The last was a screech as she looked around for the nearest available cover.

“You never get tired of being wrong do you?” Stiles asked with a beleaguered sigh.  “Deucalion’s been claiming a title that didn’t belong to him.  Anyway, it’s time for the main event: Rumble in the Preserve,” he said in an announcer voice.  “In the blue corner I give you have Jennifer Blake, Darach, former emissary, and all around psycho.  In the red corner I give you, all the way from Gevaudan, France, the Loup Garou!”

Stiles was trying to kill him with vexation (and unimaginative boxing references).  _That’s_ what he bought from the Leanansidhe!?  He was going to have to put fury on the back burner for now so terror could take the wheel.  His mate ripped off the pendant and immediately began to change, screams of agony accompanying the brutal deformation o his skeleton.  Derek couldn’t watch, but when the shrieks had become growls and finally stopped altogether he opened his eyes and got his first look at Stiles’s shift.

There weren’t any expletives that seemed right for this.

It was similar in overall form to a normal Alpha shape.  If anything it was a little smaller, but more densely muscled, grotesquely so even.  There were other major differences as well.  The proportions of the jaws and clawed hands were way off, so large and powerful looking they came close to being more ursine than canine.  The worst thing was the total absence of everything that was Stiles.  There was nothing in this beast that remembered Derek at all and wouldn’t be until sunrise or the restraining charm was restored to him.

But for all the lack of Stiles’s usual wary intelligence the creature did have one thing in abundance: power.  Even without any sort of supernatural senses Derek could feel the wild rage of the Loup Garou surrounding it in an aura of unstoppable power.

Jen tried blasting him with force.  It had no more effect on it than it had with Deucalion earlier, save for making its eyes glow a little brighter.  Next she tried lightning, but one of those trashcan lid sized paws swept up and redirected the bolt at _her_ , forcing her to throw herself sideways to evade it.

This was _bad_.  Loup Garou were the bogeymen for werewolf children and every story Derek had ever heard said that the beast shouldn’t have been able to even _access_ Stiles’s magic, much less have the focus and awareness to so casually redirect a strike that would flatten most _wizards_.  If it was still feeling rowdy after it ripped Jen to eensy weensy bits it could literally level the town with its rage.

Derek was so kicking Stiles’s ass if he didn’t get eaten.

“Stiles, wait!” Jen pled but it was no use.  The Loup roared as it blurred forward, nothing more than a dark reddish blur in Derek’s weakened eyes.  Her desperate screams soon cut off leaving only wet noises punctuated with occasional crack of splintered bone.  When the Stiles Beast rose from the ground next to the Nemeton there weren’t any remaining parts big enough to identify the Darach without DNA records.  Unless the creature had swallowed some, that is.

Derek didn’t even dare to breathe as the Loup Garou’s head swiveled towards him.  Huge nostrils flared as it tilted its head consideringly.  The fear of being torn up and eaten was replaced by the fear of something only slightly more survivable as a very different kind of growl came from the beast’s throat.  The same one Derek made during foreplay when he wanted Stiles to hurry up and move things along.  Apparently he’d been wrong.  A part of Loup!Stiles did remember him, but he could see the part in question and…no way, not happening.  There was no amount of lube that was going to make _that_ fit. 

Not easily anyway. 

Derek squashed that thought good and quick.  Maybe this was karma or something.   He had once in a while guiltily fantasized about being in his Alpha shape when he took Stiles, dark fur rubbing over pale, soft skin, feral snarls blending with high, sharp moans.  Now here he was human himself and about to be ravished by a magical demon wolf.

Irony blows.

“Stiles!” Allison cried from…somewhere.  Damn human senses!  The Loup turned to face the source of the sound only to get an arrow in the meat of its shoulder.

Silver!  Of course!  Stiles’s reason for bringing the Huntress back in was now laughably obvious. Only silver inherited from family could harm a Loup Garou (no idea why) and the Argents were bound to have tons of the stuff.

“The pendant!” she cried while the beast flailed trying to remove the arrow that had its flesh smoking and smoldering with blue fire.

Derek had marked where it fell.  Snatching it up as he ran to the Loup’s side.  The creature was too busy snapping at the arrow to pay him any attention, so for lack of a better solution he waited until its jaws were wide open and chucked the charm right into its mouth.  The look of doggie surprise as it swallowed was almost funny.

In a few seconds the magically created mass dissipated, leaving a naked and slimy Stiles in place of the half-ton monster.  “Really Der?” he asked not missing a beat, “You thought giving it to me like a dose of Tylenol was best way to go about that?  I have to wear that three days out of every month!  Why are you laughing at me!?”

Derek wasn’t _laughing_ , he was cracking the hell up, while Stiles rubbed his shoulder, freed from the pain of the silver when the extra muscle had dissolved leaving the arrowhead outside of his human skin.

Ass kicking could wait until later.  The Darach had been defeated, Deucalion was on the run, and the hostages were about to be rescued.

It was a good time to bask in the moment before the next wave of shit hit the fan.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Stiles watched bemused as Derek hugged his sister so tight she was in serious danger of being crushed to death (back to death?).  Lydia had been standing by with a couple pints of his blood to fuel the resurrection ritual as he appropriated Jen’s ill-gotten power and took back what she’d stolen from them.  As Alpha he had called his fallen packmates back through his bond with spirit of the land and voila!

God he was _exhausted_.

Sadly rest wasn’t coming any time soon, especially not with Deucalion’s little parting gift making everything just that much more complicated.

“How are you feeling, Dad?  No burning, black goop, or sense of imminent multi-system organ failure?”

The Sheriff rubbed the healing bite on his shoulder and eyed his son cautiously “No, Stiles, I’m fine.  Ish.”

That was on hell of a caveat.  While he had been busy flouting the laws of nature the ex head of the Alpha pack had slipped into the cellar and bitten their parents after the eclipse passed.

“I swear I’m going to have that fucker’s head on a pike,” Stiles snarled.

“Launguage!”

“Yes, Dad.”

Hoo boy, this was going to make for an interesting Father/Son dynamic.  Of course, he had it easy compared to Allison.

“How you doing over there, Chris?”

“Why fine, Stiles.  I’ve just been bitten by an Alpha werewolf.  The same incidentally that bit my uncle.  I believe you’re aware of what that means.”

Screw this Hunter honor crap, they had real problems to deal with.  “Well get over it.  Your daughter needs you, this town needs you, and your pack needs you.  So put on your big hunter/wolf pants and get ready for war.  If you still want to off yourself after our thrilling heroics you can go ahead.  Keep in mind though Allison’s my girl-bro and I’m not gonna promise I won’t bring you back so she can slap the martyr out of your stupid head.”  Succinct was Stiles’s middle name.

“I’ll take that under advisement,” the ex-hunter replied drily.

“I’d be more worried about Scott if I were you,” the Sheriff observed.  The man had a point.  The poor guy was staring at his mother with the exact same expression Stiles had seen in the mirror while his mother was in the hospital slowly wasting away.  It killed to see it on his friend’s face now.

“Scott would you stop fussing I’m fine!” Melissa protested, which only made him whimper louder.  They were going to have to have a talk about the canine noises.  Seriously.

“Uh…I’m not,” Isaac said, “Can we talk about the part where you guys had me in coffin for the last month?”

“It happens,” Cora wheezed from Derek’s embrace.

“We’ll just put this on the list of _Things Derek Never Told Us About But Really Should Have_.”  Her time six feet under hadn’t done much to soften Erica’s rough edges.

“How about we talk tactics?” Stiles shouted over the din as the pack fell into squabbling.  If only Talia had had some practical wisdom to impart instead of platitudes.  He hurriedly erased that thought from his brain lest she somehow detect it from the beyond, ignoring the probably imaginary feminine chuckle in his head.

“Excellent idea,” Chris said, eager to emerge victorious so he could get on with the whole suicide thing.  Ass.

“Maybe someone non-Stilinski should make these plans.  I seem to recall being electrocuted and blown up because he sucks at life.” 

“Maybe I should have left you in your box, Jerkson” Stiles groused.  They were continuing on with their barely civil banter but it was mostly out of habit.  Things had been changing between them for a while before Jackson’s brief and untimely death.  Now that he was back the two of them were casually touching whenever there wasn’t a pressing reason not to.  Scott might have some major competition for role of codependent best bro in the near future.  After all, the Beta’s eyes had turned yellow again because of his sacrifice.  Stiles was guessing that was pretty much as huge as emotional turnarounds can get.  Honestly lizardbreath was already his second in their slightly off-kilter pack structure.  That didn’t mean he had to be _nice_ to him though.

“Boys!” The Sheriff snapped.  The Alpha in Stiles growled quietly at the command.  From the expressions on Scott and Derek’s faces they felt the affront as well.  Yeah, this was going to be sooooo much fun.

“Aaaaaanyway,” he continued, “The Darach actually laid the important groundwork aleady.”  He wasn’t going to call her Jen in front of his Father.  She had used her manipulations, both mystical and mundane with a deft hand and it wasn’t just the Sheriff that was going to have to deal with simultaneously mourning her loss while hating her guts.  “Between the blast here and the funky black chaos mojo she had going on with the weather it won’t be possible to open a stable Way here from the Nevernever for _days_.  When the Fomor come they’ll have to approach from Zea’s transition area out in the preserve.”

“And what’s stopping them from just waiting it out?  Or better yet just coming in by road?” Chis asked.

“Deucalion!” Scott exclaimed.

“Got it in one, Scott my man.”  There were more than a few impressed looks around the now overflowing dining room table.  “They have to take the manor first to cut our connection to confluence and make one of their own.  They don’t know that our numbers have…recovered but they’ll expect us to fortify our position as fast as we can and we can do so way more covertly than they can call in additional troops.”

“So we just wait for them to launch an all out assault?” his Dad asked.  “I’m sorry, son, but that doesn’t sound like the best plan.  If you haven’t noticed there’s a rather large hole in this house that will make it hard to withstand a siege.”

Stiles grinned “That’s why we’re meeting them at the Way.  We open it ourselves once I get the signal that their forces are on the other side. We charge through while our allied auxiliaries attack their flanks.”

“Our what now?” Danny asked.

“Seriously?  What kind of computer nerd are you that you don’t know your way around a basic military strategy game?”

“I’m a hacker, not a nerd,” he replied loftily.

“Right.”

“That’s all great but they have what?  Magic?  Guns?  Monsters?  How are we supposed to go up against a small army and win?” Boyd asked.

“There’s more than a dozen of us now, all nearly as strong as an Alpha,” Derek replied.

“Stronger, or will be when I’m done,” Stiles corrected, “Besides, I always assumed I’d be bringing you guys back somehow so when I learned about the Fomor coming to play I made some party favors for each of you.”

“Oooooooh, do they come in red?” Erica asked while Lydia rolled her eyes.

Stiles placed a hand over his heart “You wound me, of course they do.”

“Is it too late to just put him up for adoption?” the Sheriff wondered aloud.

“Hey!”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“The Sheriff may have had a point,” Derek said looking over the abundance of leather and chainmail incorporated into Stiles’s idea of magical battle gear.  “With all this stuff it looks like we’re planning go shoot some fetish porn.  Or a Lady Gaga music video.” He amended thoughtfully.

His mate was not amused.

“Be careful or fetish porn will be all you have to help you get off,” Stiles grumbled.  He paused in his fiddling with a bit of shark mail to look at Derek lasciviously.  “Unless you wanted to do some uh… _storyboarding_ right here, right now?” he asked running his hands over the enticing contours encased in dark red leather.

“Maybe later.”  But something must have shown on Derek’s face because Stiles was on him in a second.

“Hey what’s wrong?” his mate asked taking his face in his hands.

“Nothing’s wrong” he replied pulling back.”

“I call bullshit.  If nothing’s wrong why aren’t we having steamy, leather-clad pre battle sex?  It’s traditional you know.”

Damn it there was no getting out of this “We shouldn’t until we get a chance to go pick up some…you know,” he floundered.

“Some…what?  I’m pretty sure we bought enough _accouterments_ to stock a couples’ warehouse during the brief period we actually having sex on a regular basis.  What did we leave out that’s so important?”

“Condoms!” he snapped, blushing furiously.

Stiles went slack-jawed “Um…why would we need those all of a sudden?”

“Please can we talk about this after we don’t all die?  Deaton can explain it better than me anyway.”  That was going be a whole new level of awkward.

Stiles’ eyes narrowed “Fine, but the second we’re not in mortal peril I want some answers.”  His anger faded, replaced by a sultry leer.  “After all, I’m really looking forward to tapping that tight ass of yours again.”

“I believe it’s your turn to be _tapped_ next,” Derek said primly.

“Fine, whatever.  Just remember the knot thing is an around the Full Moon deal.”

“Nope, I know you can pull it off without going all Loup Garou on my ass.”

“There’s an image,” Stiles purred.

An image Derek was _not_ thinking about.  Nope.  Not at all.  No way in hell.  His denials were thwarted somewhat by the increasingly uncomfortable situation in his jeans.  That’s it, screw it, he was switching to baggy shorts.  Stiles had a secret calf obsession anyway…

“Oh my God what are you thinking about!?  If you keep smelling like that I’m gonna jump your bones safe sex or no!”

“Sorry.”  He wasn’t.

“So no quickie?” Stiles pouted.

“Maybe you should consider the fact that we’ve been having this discussion out in the hall instead of our nice soundproofed room and every single member of the pack has heard every word.”

“Oh my God!” he wailed, mortified.

Derek surreptitiously rubbed a hand over his lower abdomen.  He could only hope he was wrong about the potential consequences of Stiles knotting him while partially shifted.

Nothing was going to happen while he had the power of positive thinking on his side.  He wanted to live after all.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“Everyone this is Zea,” Stiles said gesturing to the massive unicorn beneath him, “Zea this is everyone.”

The Elder Fae whinnied desolately.  Derek couldn’t help but stare at him in awe.  He had the build of a Clydesdale but a much greater height.  His coat, horn, even his eyes were a pure crystalline white that seemed to chill the air around him with their icy purity.  Given that the steed was actually an ancient and powerful Winter Sidhe that was probably quite literally the case.

“Wow, you just went up like two whole numbers on the Kinsey scale” Jackson quipped.

Derek sighed.  He was tempted to tell those two to just make out already, the fact that he would then be obligated to shred the Beta into confetti notwithstanding.

“So, everyone clear on the plan then?” Stiles asked.

“We run headlong into the screaming hordes of mutant fish people and hope your mystical fashion sense stops them from melting us into puddles of slurry?” Erica asked.

“Precisely,” he replied, ignoring the sarcasm.  “Our job is to be big and fangy and distracting.  After we’ve bloodied them up a bit the Wardens and the Raiths will take their flanks and help us grind them into sawdust.”

“And you’re sure these…charms will protect us long enough for that to happen?” the Sheriff asked dubiously.

“Absolutely almost certainly with just a smidge of God I hope so.”

Derek was definitely forcing Stiles into a class on public speaking during college.  To which he was absolutely going to if it took the whole pack and a team of Unseelie sled dogs to drag him there.

As one they gathered behind their Alpha.  Derek, Scott, Jackson, Danny, Boyd, Erica, Isaac, Cora, Melissa, Chris, the Sheriff.  Allison and Lydia brought up the rear, the Huntress with her bow and knives and the Banshee with two bulging saddle bags full of God only knew what kind of havoc.

“Ready?” Stiles asked.

“Fuck yeah!” Jackson called.

Erica screamed “Let’s give ‘em hell Batman!”

“I don’t believe in Faeries!” Scott cried, drawing aborted laughs from the rest of the pack.

“Let’s do this,” Stiles whispered with a deadly glint in his eye.

As his mate and lover drew the silver blade at his hip, the same type of sword that allowed the White Council’s Wardens to undo any enchantment made, Derek howled his joy and defiance.  As the cry went up, even from a slightly constipated looking Chris, a sense of belonging and support surrounded them as Stiles channeled the living essence of their territory into the unified spirit of the pack.

 _“I am always by your side, my son,”_ his mother’s voice whispered in his ear.

Derek nodded to himself, letting the wolf take over.  He shifted into his Beta shape, ready to follow his mate and Alpha into whatever lay ahead.  Around him the pack did the same, even the parents despite being only a few hours old, all of them showing brilliant red eyes to match the carmine light of dawn just beginning to peek over the treetops.

The Unicorn reared up onto his hind legs, slashing along a diagonal with his horn, shearing a rift between this world and the next.

Remembering the words of prophecy Stiles had spoken in what seemed like another life Derek intoned “The Red Wolf Rides with the Rising Sun.”

His mate looked back at him curiously for a moment before giving him a wild smile full of the simple, unadulterated joy of the hunt.  Stiles loosed a battle cry that could never have come from a normal human throat and lowered his blade to the horizontal, signaling the charge.  As they surged forward into the spirit world they were joined by dozens of spectral wolves, eyes alight with battlelust.  Derek knew them all.  He called to his pack, both past and present, their howls combining into a hurricane of sound that shook the withered trees of the Leanansidhe’s hunting grounds.  They ran into the fray with his sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts, parents, grandparents and more at his heels.  The walls separating them crumbled and fell as the Hale pack made their stand, a unified, wild, unstoppable force.

Afterwards he would remember little of the battle itself, just flashes.  Stiles throwing down Deucalion, Jackson and Danny turning a squad of humanoid servitors into so much ground chuck, Thomas Raith and his kin shredding the trollish creatures at the rear with blade and gunfire, the Wardens rushing in to deal with the Fomor Lords and their entropic magics.  It seemed to only last for seconds before Stiles was greeting their allies on a field of victory and leading them back through shimmering curtain of the Way.

As soon as they were back on their own soil they all piled onto Stiles, Derek, and Scott, forgoing human decorum and yipping with unrestrained joy as they nuzzled in to the warmth radiating from their Alphas.

Yes they had a lot of work to do, but the pack was stronger than ever, and with The Red Wolf at their head the future of Beacon Hills was looking bright.


	10. They're Red Hot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victory! The reunited pack accepts their new members and starts looking towards the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end!

They were going to need a bigger table.

Before they could determine just how much bigger there was a piece of business that had to be taken care of.

“And this is necessary because…?”

Jackson had recovered first from the whopping dose of happy pack feels left in the wake of harnessing the spirit of the land.  Or maybe all the warm fuzzies just couldn’t penetrate his thick reptilian hide.  Stiles was spending so much time praying for patience he was in danger of becoming religious.

“Their eyes, look at their eyes.”

“They’re not as pretty as yours,” Derek said in between nibbling on Stiles’s neck and rubbing their cheeks together.  His mate had been particularly affected by getting all soul-blendy with the Hale spirits.  Stiles was in no rush to dispel his good mood, even if the stubble burn was beginning to chafe something fierce.

“Thank you, Der,” he said patting him on the head and gently pushing him off.  The two former Alphas kneeling on the ground in front of them were watching their _pack’s Eat, Pray, Love_ shenanigans with a mixture of amusement, fear, and longing.  “We are here to pass judgment on two who have wronged us.”

“Again, what does the color of their eyes have to do with it?”

“They’re yellow!” he snarled.  “Ergo, not cold-blooded killers.  If the story they told Danny and Lydia is true then they what they did to their own pack was plenty justified.  In fact, as far as we know the only people they’ve killed that didn’t deserve it are in this room and _not_ dead.  So I think it’s only fair that it falls to them to decide.  Danny, Isaac, what do you think?”

The two of them were giggling and whispering to each other, and not paying any attention whatsoever.

“Guys!”

“Um…they killed me?” Isaac offered, “So I vote no.”

“Hey Stiles killed us too!” Danny countered, “For which I totally forgive you by the way.  Ethan’s not a bad guy; I say yes.”  The hacker blushed at the shy, grateful smile Tweedle Twink gave him in return.

“Just what we need, _more_ puppy love,” he muttered running his hand through his hair and bating away Derek’s, which had begun to wander.  “How about you, Lydia?  You know Tweedle Twunk best.”

Stiles would have been shaking in his boots if the Banshee had leveled that icy analytical stare at him, but Aiden merely sat back on his heels and lifted his chin defiantly.  “You can’t take one without the other,” she finally said with a sigh.  “You stripped them of their Alpha status?”  Stiles nodded.  He’d wanted to make sure none of Jen’s dark power remained in the Nemeton to cause more mischief down the road.  If that meant bringing back the twins, albeit as Betas instead of Alphas, then all the better.  He’d had enough of murder.  “Then I vote yes.  They can be our pack’s Omegas, see if they can work their way back into my good graces.”

Aiden nodded curtly but there was a definite glimmer of hope in his eyes.  Sheesh, it was like the twins were Jackson split into to two slightly less taxing people.  Lydia and Danny clearly had a type.

“That settles it then, welcome to our pack.”  He offered them help up, using way more strength than necessary and all but crushing their hands in his.  It was petty, sure, but he felt a rush of satisfaction at the display of dominance.  He turned to their last holdout “And how about you Chris?”

The Hunter-turned-wolf was flicking his claws in and out like he was expecting to wake up from a dream.

“Chris!  Snap out of it!”

He started “Oh, sorry _Alpha_ ,” he sneered, “but I’m still having some trouble adjusting.”  It seemed Jackson wasn’t the only one immune to happy shiny people.

Stiles rolled his eyes “Look at yourself you tool, you already have perfect control and you know if you ever became a danger to anyone I’d cut in half myself.”  He was inwardly shocked when he realized he meant it.

Chris looked at him through narrowed eyes but nodded minutely.

“Groovy!  I think this calls for a party or a feast or something!  Derek what’s the wolfy protocol for post-battle celebrations?”

“Well, I have a few ideas…” he growled, attaching himself to Stiles like a limpet and sucking his earlobe into his mouth.

“Let’s keep it PG-13 until you come down, okay?”  Derek _whimpered_ in reply.  “Why don’t you go upstairs and lie down, alright?  I’ll be up just as soon as I get everybody organized down here.”  His mate nodded vigorously.  Stiles snapped his fingers at the twins “Hey, Tweedles, follow Derek upstairs and he can show you the empty bedrooms.  Since you’re not high as a kite right now I guess you get first pick.”

The three of them trudged off while the rest of the pack devolved into an animated debate over what kind of take-out to order.  Stiles found his Father with Melissa in the kitchen.  “How are you two doing with all the…everything?”

The Sheriff sighed “It’s a lot to take in.  I feel kind of like I did when we had the Packnet but it’s subtler and deeper somehow.”  He sighed and lowered his head.  Stiles was not going to ask about the whole Jen nightmare, not yet anyway.

“I think it’s going to be fine,” said Melissa.  “Family is what matters.  It’s just like what we had before just…more.”

“Yeah, now we have to follow our children’s orders” the Sheriff muttered wryly.

“Oh come on, Dad, weren’t you already doing that before?”  Stiles grinned mischeviously at his Beta/Father.

“Very funny, son.  If the magic thing doesn’t work out for you it’s good to know you have a career in standup comedy to fall back on.”

Melissa swatted his Father on the arm playfully “Hey!  Respect the Alpha!”

“Of course, what was I thinking?”

Stiles left them to discuss the care and keeping of teenage werewolves and went to find the last member of extended family, and the only one save Lydia who wasn’t some kind of wolf.

He found him in the greenhouse staring at a rosebush like it had just told him he had three months to live “Hey Uncle Tommy, got a sec?”  The other Raiths had said goodbye at the way, which was fine with Stiles, but he wanted to have a chance to introduce his Uncle/Cousin to his pack.

“Sure.”  The incubus did not look good.  There were dark hollows under his eyes and his skin seemed too tight over his cheekbones, like he’d withered slightly.

“You miss him, don’t you?”

Thomas shrugged.

“I saw my mother.”  That got a fractional reaction.  “When I asked her about Harry she said something odd.”

“Oh?”

“Look around here.  Sometimes people aren’t really gone and even when they are they’re never as far away as they seem.”

“Is that supposed to be comforting?” the man snarled, eyes turning metallic silver in his anger.

“It is what it is,” Stiles shrugged.  “But I think it’s a mistake to count out Harry Dresden prematurely.  Besides, sometimes people come back.”

Thomas went back to staring at the roses but this time there was a flicker of life on his face and his expression was thoughtful.

Stiles heard the Wardens approaching the manor from the direction of the Way and went out to meet them.

“Alpha Stilinski,” Captain Luccio greeted him formally.

“Captain.”

“Gotta say, kid, that was one of the crazier things I’ve ever seen,” Carlos said with a laugh.

“What can I say?  I know how to host a party.”

“Maybe next time a little less sea monster guts and a few more beautiful girls.”

“I’m not sure you could handle a werewolf,” he teased.

“Boys,” Luccio sighed.  She had gotten used to their back and forth during their Worst Vacation to Italy Ever, but for all that she looked twenty five she was over two hundred and sometimes it showed in her exasperation with their youthful high jinks.

“Sorry,” Stiles said, “I’ll have your first order ready by the end of next month.”

“Good.  Have you made arrangements for the holiday season yet?”

“No, got a bit going on right now.”

“I suppose so.”

“We’ll say hi to Ebenezar for you.  He was sorry he couldn’t come himself but all this was a little too high-profile,” said Carlos.

“I understand.  Well, it’s been fun but I have a pack to feed and a mate that needs attention so…”

“Of course, I wouldn’t want to keep Derek waiting either,” Luccio said with a wicked smile that showed off her killer dimples.

“Captain,” Carlos groaned.

“S’Okay, Los.  Next time you’re in town maybe I’ll set you up with his sister.  We can double.”

The Warden tilted his head thoughtfully.  “Maybe.”  Oh yeah, this was happening.  Cora was going to eat him _alive_.

Luccio rolled her eyes “Come on, Ramirez, we have a long way to go.”

“Adios, Stiles,” he said shaking his hand.

“Vaya con Dios, dude.”

“Until we meet again,” Luccio said with a slight bow.

Stiles stayed there listening to their footfalls until they entered the Way, just to make sure they weren’t ambushed by and Fomor stragglers that may have slipped by.  They’d bought themselves a window to breathe in but he wasn’t naïve enough to think that their freakish undersea enemy was going to let this kind of insult go unanswered.

But for right now: food, lots of food.  And Derek, lots and lots of Derek.  Maybe his mate would come with him over winter break.  He’d promised to meet Luccio at her forge in Tuscany to hammer out some more Warden blades.  Christmas in Italy was too romantic to pass up and Lydia had made a comment about how much Derek had liked the idea of seeing him “hammering away at the anvil”.  Unfortunately it was only just October.

And he had a history paper to write.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've made some allusions to Mpreg. I haven't really made up my mind. If I go with it won't be like it usually appears in this fandom. In my headcannon it's not a normal part of werewolf biology but something a lot darker and less pleasant that holds a nasty place in werewolf history.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments, please, they're half the fun.
> 
> Copyright disclaimer, yadda yadda yadda.
> 
> That reminds me. One of the events in the previous fic is similar to the inciting incident in someone else's work. Similar but not the same in detail, mechanisms, context, or significance. There was no deliberate plagiarism involved but based on my observation of AO3 customs it seems polite to add a disclaimer and a compliment to my fellow author who's name escapes me. I love your work.
> 
> Also, as I wrote the successive fics I forgot to include the running jokes and thematic elements that make the series title not stupid. Any thoughts on a replacement?


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